


stories for other people

by JustStandingHere



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Domestic Bliss, Hand Jobs, M/M, Mutual Pining, Road Trips, Slow dances, and other things yet to be discovered!, hand holding, odes to the oregon coast, parties!!, stories as a means of projection as a means of truth in untruth, time jumps
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:08:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26632639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustStandingHere/pseuds/JustStandingHere
Summary: "BJ keeps looking to Hawkeye, hoping he’ll get the message. He has to get the message, it’s spelled out so clear. Like lines in the sand. Like moving rocks in the middle of the night. Like words that mean something, if you look at them the right way."
Relationships: B. J. Hunnicutt/Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce
Comments: 51
Kudos: 141





	stories for other people

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the amazing [attheborder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/attheborder/pseuds/attheborder) for beta-ing this monster! This fic also has a [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5YXilbWiuWoSFa3UMWKdme?si=jwYOc3njSnyvz_RQ7yfI5g), if you want to give that a listen. Happy reading!

Later, when it’s all said and done, they bicker on their front porch. “We’re old war buddies,” they say, when anyone asks, but war buddies don’t usually dance to the radio when the moon is out. Or, at least, none of the war buddies this neighborhood has seen. But besides dancing, most of what they do is reminisce, and in the middle of reminiscing, there’s the bickering. Little details slipped from one mind to another, accusations of falsehood punctuated by a soft “oh, oh yeah, you’re right” and then a period of much-deserved gloating. 

They bicker about little things—were Margaret’s pajamas pink or blue? What year did that happen, again? It couldn’t have been 1952—or maybe it was, who’s to say? Mostly, they bicker about when it all started. They don’t go by months and dates—even their actual, for-real anniversary is an approximation, the 15th of December because it sounds right. In all actuality it could’ve been January, or maybe even late November. They didn’t get back on normal, linear time until somewhere around May of 1954, and even that date is muddled. Instead, they go by landmarks, little bits of memory they can pin on themselves like corkboard. Or, in this case, days in numbers.

“Day one,” Hawkeye says. “I loved you from day one.”

It’s just after dinner, and the sun’s just set. In the deep indigo, the only light anyone can see comes from porch and street lights. Out in the darkness, Yaquina Head slowly blinks on and off. This is their favorite time of night to talk. In San Francisco they never had nights as quiet and dark as these. It’s unnerving, a bit—they’re both creatures of noise, but it’s easier to wake up from nightmares to the sound of ocean waves than the sound of a car backfiring.

“Oh, please,” BJ argues. “You were so hung up on Trapper you hardly noticed me.”

Hawkeye rolls his eyes. This is an argument they’ve had time in and time out. “I noticed you! I noticed you plenty. It’s not my fault you didn’t notice me back.”

“I noticed you immediately!”

“What else was there to notice, hm? The dust? The Jeeps?”

BJ then turns to his daughter, who is leaning against the railing. “Er-Bear, help me out here.” 

She’s smoking, which neither of them particularly approves, but when they bring it up she’s quick to bring up a list of activities they did in Korea that far outweighs a pack of American Spirits a week. She’s twenty-two, after all. She goes to college. She can make her own decisions. “How can I?” she asks. “I wasn’t even there!”

BJ turns back to Hawkeye. The crickets are starting to put up a racket, and the air smells like sea salt. He sighs. “It’s true,” he admits. “I didn’t love you from day one.”

Hawkeye looks to Erin and gestures. “See? He admits it!”

“I loved you from day 26,” BJ says.

“What?” Hawkeye leans forward in his chair. His hair has, after a never-ending period of grey, finally started to go white around the ears. It delights BJ to no end to repeat old jokes Hawkeye has told him over the years.

BJ grins, knowing he’s won the argument. What it’s about anymore, he can’t be sure. But the trophy is his. “Day 26. I was still counting, then.”

“What happened?” Erin asks. She scrunches her face at the question, a trait she got from Peggy.

BJ smiles, a bit to himself, and looks to Hawkeye. He feels so sentimental he thinks he could swim in it. “Well.” He takes Hawkeye’s hand in his, fingers dancing around themselves less out of clumsiness and more out of a simple want to relish the act. “We danced.”

* * *

There’s an odd moment that happens when the work gets slow. Time becomes something that happens to other people. BJ’s only kept track of the days because he thinks it’ll keep himself sane, but he’s quickly finding out that’s not the case. People will get drunk after work, the American pastime of the ages, only after work could be any time between 5am and 5pm. So there’s an odd fog around the officer’s club now, where half the people are finally sobering up, and the other half are two, if not three or four sheets to the wind. And given the past week’s recent barrage of casualties, it’s a somber kind of drunk. Even Mulcahy is playing the blues on the piano.

“I swear it’s only like this 70% of the time,” Hawkeye tells him. The darts have gone missing, so he throws a peanut at the board. “What do you think that is, twenty points?”

BJ lolls his head to the side. “More like fifteen.”

Hawkeye raises his eyebrows, and tosses a peanut on the top of Frank’s head. The man spins, looking around for the culprit. The two of them play the picture perfect of innocence, and when Frank settles back into his chair they collapse into stifled giggles.

“Okay,” BJ says. “Okay, _that_ gets you twenty.”

“What’ll get me thirty?” Hawkeye asks.

“Depends on how bad you want it,” BJ says. Hawkeye laughs and throws another peanut.

BJ likes Hawkeye—he’s funny, and charming, and the only thing in this place that makes some sort of sense, even if BJ can’t explain him to other people. He’s tried describing him to Peg in detail, but still feels like he’s coming up short.

BJ looks around. It’s a sad sight, full of sad people. If this is the 70%, he wonders how he’ll get through the next few months. Or even the next few years, if it comes to that. He focuses on his drink instead, fidgeting with the rim of the glass.

“I sure hope the other 30% is worth it,” he says, mostly to himself.

He and Hawkeye exchange a glance. That’s one thing he’s not gotten used to in Korea, the way he can just communicate to people without having to make up something to say. You look, and you do. It’s meatball surgery. It’s war. But when he looks at Hawkeye, there’s an added...something. He can’t put his finger on it. Like they’re volleying some shared part of themselves back and forth to each other, and any mutual understanding they have is just a beneficial side effect.

Hawkeye pats BJ on the shoulder and pushes off the bar and over to the piano. BJ watches as Hawkeye drapes himself over the instrument, as he does, all arms and legs. He watches an earnest face turn into a smile as he talks to Father Mulcahy, and the music stops. For a minute all is quiet, and then the notes turn to something more show-tuney. After a couple seconds, BJ recognizes the tune as “It’s De-Lovely”.

The notes fly around the room, and people previously slumped over started to lift their heads up as Hawkeye traipses around the bar, putting on an affected stroll.

“I feel a sudden urge to sing!” Hawkeye half belts, half yells. He gestures to the air. “The kind of ditty that invokes the spring!”

The crowd in the O Bar starts to liven up a bit, some giving whoops and cheers. Frank gives a kind of “Ah!”-ing sneer, and Hawkeye walks over and points at him. “So control your desire to curse,” he sings, “while I crucify the verse!” He stays with Frank for a bit, singing his loudest and his worst. He leans on Frank’s table so hard the man’s drink topples over, and the next few lines are interspersed with Frank yelling about Pierce ruining his night, and how Potter will hear about this, and so on, before Potter himself tells Burns to shut up and enjoy the show.

The piano kicks up and Hawkeye’s attention goes back to the crowd. He shimmies in skirts that don’t exist, knees and elbows swinging, all the while singing at the top of his lungs.

“Oh, the night is young,” he sings, “The sky is clear, and if you want to go walking dear, it’s delightful, it’s delicious, it’s de-lovely!” 

The crowd’s interested now, and so’s BJ. His eyes follow Hawkeye like the man’s just invented movement. In a way, he has. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen someone so dedicated to a bit. It’s infectious. It’s insane. It’s awe-inducing.

BJ can’t help himself. He hops off his stool and goes to join Hawkeye. Without missing a beat, he insinuates himself into the performance, swinging himself back and forth and trying to follow along to the lyrics. 

“Time marches on, and so it’s plain,” Hawkeye sings, and grabs BJ’s hands. They go in a circle, like kids playing ring around the rosie, laughter infecting their singing. “You’ve won my heart, and I’ve lost my brain! It’s delightful!”

“It’s delicious!” BJ laughs back.

“It’s de-lovely!” Hawkeye sings. “Life seems so sweet that we decide—” BJ pulls him to the back of the club, creating an aisle of people who accommodate them, laughing and singing with them. “—it’s in the bag to get unified! It’s delightful!” 

BJ offers his crooked arm to Hawkeye. “It’s delicious!”

Hawkeye takes it. “It’s de-lovely!” A small thrill goes down BJ’s back at the feeling of the man’s pulse next to his. It’s beating so fast. They start to walk down the makeshift aisle.

“See the crowd at the church!” Hawkeye sings, sweeping a hand to the other nurses and enlisted men who are playing along.

BJ gestures to Father Mulcahy at the piano. “See the proud parson plopped on his perch!” That gets a right kick out of the crowd. 

Hawkeye grins and nearly misses the next line, turning BJ with their elbows still interlocked before running back to the bar and hopping on the table. BJ follows. “Get the sweet beat of that organ pealing our doom!” He extends a hand, and BJ takes it, rocketing up five feet above everybody else. He doesn’t let go, and instead puts his other hand on Hawkeye’s waist, pulling them close. _It makes for a good show_ , he reasons, but he doesn’t quite believe it. It has the intended effect, because the air seems to get knocked out of Hawkeye for a second before he recovers, putting a hand on BJ’s shoulder, grinning to the crowd: “Here goes the groom!”

“How they cheer, how they smile—” they cry. Their dance is a bit more coordinated than the circles they were doing before, but it’s limited to the bar countertop, which BJ hasn’t been paying attention to in favor of watching Hawkeye. BJ would call it swing, but it’s more of a fast-paced, drunken waltz. “—as we go galloping down the aisle!”

The song hits it’s crescendo (“It's divine, dear, it's da-veen, dear, it's da-wunderbar, It's da-victory, it's da-wallop, it's da-vinner, it's da-voice, it's de-lovely!”) and maybe it’s the cheers from the crowd, or the music, or just the feeling of having someone close, but as the last few words rocket out of their mouths, BJ turns, grabs a hold of the small of Hawkeye’s back, and dips him.

The piano goes out in a flourish. The crowd goes wild. The idea that this place was ever somber feels like a far distant memory, but all BJ can do is look at Hawkeye’s face, with his wide eyes and wide smile.

“You sure know how to treat a girl,” Hawkeye says. BJ can feel his chest breathing heavy against him.

“Only the best,” BJ says. His voice sounds like it’s been shoved through gravel.

He pulls Hawk up from the dip. He wants to just look at him a little while longer, but they part and turn to the crowd with their hands still clasped. They do one, two, three bows to an onslaught of hoots and hollers. Then, as quickly as it happened, they let go. BJ’s fingers feel warm and sticky. He’s going to hate washing them tomorrow.

* * *

He doesn’t know it’s love. Not yet. But every second with Hawkeye he’s trying to recreate that moment a little bit. Any excuse to get his hands on him, to get that same kind of thrill. At night, when even the crickets start to tire out, he stares at the canvas ceiling and replays the feeling of their elbows wrapped around each other, or their chests breathing in tandem.

He can feel something trying to break through the surface—an itch in the back of his mind he’s trying hard not to scratch.

“What’s on your mind?” Hawk will ask him, on the nights when it's too hot for anyone to lie down comfortably.

 _That's what I'm afraid to ask_ , BJ doesn't say. “What’s on anybody’s minds, here?” he’ll ask. “What’s on your mind?” And Hawkeye will answer, and BJ will listen. He keeps his eyes focused on the tent.

* * *

Some time later, when Erin’s watching TV on the sofa and they’re both finishing up the dishes, Hawkeye puts a plate down and turns to BJ. “It doesn’t count,” he says.

“What doesn’t count?” BJ asks, and takes the plate from Hawkeye's hands to dry.

“The dance, the day 26, that doesn't count. You still thought you were as straight as a pole.” He picks up another plate, then puts it back down. “You still thought _I_ was as straight as a pole.”

“Doesn't mean I wasn't in love with you,” BJ argues.

Hawkeye waves it off. “Yeah, yeah, but it’s the principle of the thing here. You didn't know.”

“And you knew?” BJ asks, a smile forming on his face. He sets the dish down and turns to Hawkeye. “From day one?”

“I saw you standing there and thought that if you weren't a married man I'd make you one.” If this were years earlier BJ might’ve taken it as a joke, but they know each other better now than they used to, and even back then they knew each other very well. Hawkeye looks at him for a beat before turning back to the dishes.

BJ puts his towel down and sidles up next to Hawkeye. “Okay, so maybe I was a little slow on the uptake. I’ll try and make it up to you.”

“How?” Hawkeye asks, not looking up.

BJ wraps a hand around his waist. “I have a few ideas.”

Hawkeye puts the dish down again and looks to BJ with a grin. “If they're not absolutely devious, I don't wanna hear them.”

“Anything less than devious?” BJ asks. He puts a hand on Hawkeye’s hips so they’re turned face to face. “For you? Never.”

“Oh? What's the first idea?”

BJ hums, pretending to think. “We’re in a hotel room, on the beach.” He stops. “A tropical beach,” he corrects.

“Okay,” Haweye says, grin getting wider. He sidles up a little closer.

“And…” BJ pretends to think about it a little more. He fixes a couple stray hairs on Hawkeye’s forehead. “The doors are open. There’s a bit of a warm breeze coming through.”

“Which we can both feel all over.” Hawkeye strokes his hand up and down BJ’s arm.

BJ nods. “Naturally. We’re on the bed—king size mattress.”

“Oh, I do love a good king size mattress,” Hawkeye says, shaking his head in fondness.

“I know you do. And first I kiss your lips.” Which he does. “Then your neck.” Which he also does. “Then right below your ear.” Which he also _also_ does, and stays there a little to nip a bit at the skin.

He can feel Hawkeye’s breath get shallow. “I do...I do enjoy the interactivity of this idea.” BJ nips again, and Hawkeye laughs. “Aha, what happens next?”

BJ pulls away, but only an inch or so. “Well—”

There’s the sound of footsteps. “Hey, do we have any—oh, _gross_!”

The two of them pull away to see Erin, freshly in her sweats, with a look of utter disgust on her face that’s half-real, half-exaggeration. She points to her mouth and makes a gagging noise. Yes, definitely an exaggeration. She’s got that trait from Hawkeye.

“Erin, this is perfectly natural,” Hawkeye says, BJ’s arms still around his waist. “I know we should’ve had the talk with you sooner, but when a daddy and a daddy love each other, _very_ much—”

“I know enough,” Erin says. “They covered necking in high school, right after they taught us the food pyramid.” The joking she’s seemed to have gotten from the both of them, which was mostly funny for both sets of parents until she hit puberty. Now it's just downright embarrassing.

Still, they don't miss a beat, “Glad to see they’ve updated the curriculum,” Hawkeye says, turning to BJ. “Mine only covered hand holding.”

“Mine covered pre-marital hand-holding,” BJ jokes right back. It's second nature. “The parents threw a riot.”

“Well, you know what they say, one day it’s hand holding the next it’s fing—” He seems to remember their present company and stops short. “—erless gloves.”

“No protection,” BJ improvises, then wants to kick himself. “From the cold, I mean.”

Erin barks out a laugh. “Nice save. Do we have any ice cream left?” BJ nods, and Erin fishes around and grabs the whole tub and a spoon. No one makes the argument for only having a bowl. She heads out of the kitchen, turning at the last second and pointing to the two of them with her spoon. “Now don’t you two crazy kids get up to anything.”

The minute she’s out of the room, they let go of each other. The moment is, effectively, ruined. 

“Scolded,” BJ marvels. “By our own kid!”

Hawkeye shakes his head. “We’re a disgrace.”

“We’re the worst,” BJ agrees. They look at each other, a moment of silence passing through them, before they both burst out into laughter.

* * *

A few hours later, when they’re both in bed and nearing sleep, Hawkeye turns to BJ. “Okay, but when did you _know_ know?”

BJ groans and nuzzles into the top of Hawkeye’s head. “Why are we still talking about this?”

“Don’t you know I’m a narcissist?” Hawkeye teases.

“I thought the mirror looked a little dirty,” BJ says. He pulls away. “I’ve told you before.”

In the dark, he can see traces of Hawkeye smiling. He pinches the collar of BJ’s t-shirt between two fingers and tugs. “Could you tell me again?”

BJ smiles. He loves this story. “Okay,” he says. “Imagine: Korea, a hundred years ago.”

* * *

BJ doesn’t know it’s love until he does. It smacks him in the face. Later, he’ll say it was like a frog in a pot of boiling water. He didn’t know he was done for until it was too late, until he’d already accrued so much of it he couldn’t let go of it. And during that later time Hawkeye will call him a sap, and then proceed to kiss him senseless.

Back in time, the days turn to weeks turn to months. BJ learns to live with the 70%, but finds that with Hawkeye it’s more like 55%, and some change. Margaret gets engaged, then married. Frank goes crazy. In the hot summer days, BJ and Hawkeye sit shoulder to shoulder and trade fantasies. In the winter, they fall asleep on each other in front of the stove. BJ writes home only about some of these things. The itch persists. It has a name, BJ knows. It has a name and he’s not going to speak it—not even in his head, much less out loud.

It’s late winter now. BJ’s been here for months—it feels like years, but he checks the calendar every couple of weeks to make sure he’s got the time right. The extreme cold has finally left, but there’s still a chill to the air. The two of them are crowded around the stove—BJ sitting cross-legged on his cot and Hawkeye’s lounging in a spare chair. Some scotch from a gracious enlisted man sits on the table between them. BJ nurses a glass, playing cards, while Hawkeye wrangles with a massive woolen monstrosity, thread and needles in hand.

"I'm as corny as Kansas in August, high as a flag on the Fourth of July," Hawkeye sings as he sews. BJ watches as he mumbles through the next few lines, focusing on a stitch. “Oh please ahmhm ahmhmhmhmhm I’m in love with a hmhmhm guy.” He seems to get it. He grins. "I'm as trite and as gay as a daisy in May, a cliche coming true!"

"But are you bromidic and bright?" BJ asks from his game of solitaire.

"As a moon happy night pouring light on the dew!" Hawkeye tells him. He ties off his thread and stands up. "Now come on, try this on."

BJ rolls his eyes and walks over. Hawkeye fits the neck of the thing over BJ's head, and BJ manages to find his way through the two armholes and come out the other side. BJ looks down at himself. The sweater is a dark blue, the crochet pattern full of loose threads and areas where Hawkeye obviously got bored and decided to wing it a bit. It's the ugliest thing he's ever seen. He loves it.

"It's a bit big," he points out. He's less wearing it and more swimming in it.

"Sorry, when I got your measurements I mostly went off of your shoe size," Hawkeye says. He fidgets with the fabric, plucking and adjusting here and there. BJ has the sudden memory of getting help with his tie the morning before work, and goes warm all over. If anyone sees pink, he'll try to blame it on the cold.

Hawkeye continues to fuss, a deep frown set on his face. He's been working on this sweater, on and off, since their last winter when BJ complained of the cold. It's a gift with a lot of work put into it. It's a labor of...

Well, it's a labor.

Hawkeye tries to dust some imaginary lint off BJ's collar, and BJ grabs his wrist. "Hey," he says. "I really like it, I do."

Hawkeye looks up. The man rarely looks unsure, but it's plastered all over his face now. It's gone as soon as it's seen. "Well, of course you do," Hawkeye says. "This is master knittery, up there with uh, with—"

"Betty Cable-Knit?" BJ suggests.

"I was gonna say Lucille Ball o' Yarn," Hawkeye admits. He goes back to fidgeting with the sweater. BJ doesn't mind. Being the focus of Hawkeye's nervous attention makes him feel funny inside. A good funny.

"See anything you like?" he asks.

Hawkeye looks up again. "Hm? Oh, no, no. Just looking for holes."

BJ shrugs. "I trust your hands,” he says, and holds the palm of one, splaying it out in front of his face and pretending to examine it. In the back of his head, he makes a small card catalogue of all the scars on Hawkeye’s knuckles.

Hawkeye hums. "You do, do you?"

BJ peeks out from behind Hawkeye’s hand. "Of course, I do. They're handy."

Hawkeye chuckles, and his hands grip the fabric a little looser. "Oh, that's bad,” Hawkeye laughs. “That's worse than your usual."

"That's not even my worst,” BJ argues.

"What's your worst, then?” He smiles at him, but seems to second-guess himself. The hand wrenches itself from BJ’s grip.

BJ grins. "You wouldn't be able to handle it."

Hawkeye laughs. “You! Oh…” He seems to collapse face-first into BJ’s chest, snorting up a riot. He’s a little drunk. They both are. BJ chuckles to himself, and revels in the kind of uninhibited warmth that seems to course through his body as Hawkeye grabs hold to one of BJ’s sleeves and laughs his heart out. He finally looks up, still laughing, and lets the sound slowly dissolve as he goes back to inspecting the stitches on the sweater’s shoulder, laughter hiccuping out of him like he can’t help.

And BJ, without preamble, thinks, _God, I really love you_.

And there it is. The itch. The funny, funny feeling, not so funny anymore. In retrospect, it will be hilarious, but it feels dead serious now. BJ’s a married man, after all. He’s got a kid. He’s fallen off the fidelity wagon once and still hates himself for it, and now—what’s he supposed to do with this? With all this love he’s got now that he’s named it?

And that’s not to mention the fact that this isn’t the conventional kind of love story—BJ’s always known something was off about himself, but he figured that as long as he ignored whatever it was it wouldn’t affect him. Now that he sees it he can’t take his eyes off of it. He thinks about how he always went after the girls everyone else seemed to think were swell, about drunken parties in college where he thought the funniest thing in the world would be to kiss one of his friends. _Wouldn’t that be something?_ he’d ask himself. He asks the same thing, Hawkeye in front of him, and feels a new fresh terror in his throat. Yes, it would be something. It scares the hell out of him.

It must be obvious that something’s wrong, because Hawkeye takes one look at him and frowns. “If you hate it, you can tell me,” he says. “The sweater, I mean.”

BJ snaps out of his spiral. “What?”

“You’re making a face,” Hawkeye says.

BJ tries to play it cool. “I’m not making a face!” Which is a lie, which makes him feel even more guilty.

Hawkeye points. “There it is! There’s that face again!”

“I’m not—I love it, I do!” Even saying that aloud he feels like he’s making a confession, like now that he can see himself so can the world. Every word and action now feels so obvious. Moving away from Hawkeye, he circles around to the shaving mirror and stands back. The sweater is huge on him, bagging along the bottom and loose around the collar, but it fills him with such warmth that, for a second, the love is easier to hold onto. “It’s the perfect winter sweater.”

Hawkeye smiles. “You’re only saying that because I sleep with you every night,” he says. He jokes—it’s a joke. BJ’s sure it’s a joke.

BJ sighs. “What can I do to prove to you that I like it?”

“Nothing! If you don’t like it, I just want you to tell me.”

“But I do!” He shakes his head. “Here,” he says, and goes over to his footlocker. He pulls out an old grey sweater he usually favors—it’s warm, and he’d packed it from home—and balls it up. He opens up the stove door and throws it in.

It almost smothers the fire for a second, before it bursts into bright orange flame.

“Beej, what the hell?” Hawkeye asks.

“Now I’ll just wear this one instead,” BJ says. “I never liked grey all that much, anyway.” And he’s beginning to realize he’s telling the truth. He got that sweater as a gift years ago, and he’s only worn it because that’s what you’re supposed to do with gifts. He sits down on the edge of his cot and watches the thread catch fire.

Hawkeye stands there, slacked jawed, before turning to where BJ is. “You’re a madman.”

BJ cringes a little at that. “I prefer ‘quick thinker’.”

“Absolute nutcase.”

“Loyal friend.”

“A man of many talents, most of them devious beyond a doubt.” He grins and knocks his boot against BJ’s knee. “I knew there was a reason I liked you.”

BJ grins at that, a bit sheepishly. Hawkeye sits back down in his chair and starts unspooling a ball of yarn. “I think I’ll make you a scarf to match,” he says, and starts humming again. “I am in a conventional dither…” he sings, and continues to hum the rest. BJ occasionally looks up from his solitaire game and notes how golden the tent has become, from the bright light of the stove. And the love carries itself a little lighter. Still there, but like how he carries his own head. Like it’s a little less terrifying. Like it’s natural.

He turns back to his solitaire game and turns over one of his cards. King of Hearts. He tries not to find the irony in that, and reassesses his pile.

* * *

“Ha!” Erin yells. She slaps her hand down on the deck of cards. “Sandwich.”

BJ groans and leans back in the porch chair in defeat. The sun is out, probably the last warm day they’ll get for the year as September starts to wind the days down shorter and shorter. They’re going to have to take down all the buoys they’ve got hung up on the railing, lest they want a repeat of last winter where one got blown through the front window. A couple seagulls chime in the early morning.

“I’ve taught you too well,” he says. He looks at his dwindling deck of cards and puts them down in surrender.

“I could be a dealer in Vegas if I wanted,” Erin says. She shrugs. “If they played Screw You, Rat.” The name came from a joke Hawkeye made once while he and BJ were playing, and it was quick to catch on. Especially for Erin who, being seven, thought that was what the game was legitimately called. She’s never called it Egyptian Ratscrew, either because it’s funny or out of sheer stubbornness. BJ guesses a mix of both.

BJ gathers the cards up and ties a worn rubber band around them, then goes about dusting some sand off the front of the table. They’re still a few blocks from the beach, but the stuff seems to find its way in. When they’d first moved in, they’d make notes of the odd places the sand would end up—it helped to pass the time, in a coastal town in winter. After Erin left for college they’d settled on Newport, since they’d driven through it on an impulsive road trip some years earlier. “California and Maine meet in Oregon, who would’ve thought?” Hawkeye had asked. “It’s always the last place you look.” They’d carved a fun little life here, with a few fellow degenerate locals to call friends and working shifts at the local hospital.

Erin sits back in her chair. “Does Hawkeye know why I’m here?”

BJ laughs. “Ah, no. Not yet. He thinks you’re here because you miss us.” He waits a beat. “You do miss us, right?”

“Of course I do!” Erin says with an eyeroll. “Dad, I call you guys once a week. If it wasn’t for the phone bill I’d call you a lot more.” She crosses her arms. “So what’s the plan?”

“The plan is—” BJ says, but he hears the telltale signs of Hawkeye storming about. He’s probably turned on the TV to the morning news. He looks to Erin. “The plan is, I’ll tell you the plan later.”

Erin nods. “Good plan,” she says sarcastically.

Hawkeye comes through the door. “Do you think Billie Jean King is a lesbian? I know, I know she’s married but she’s got a certain air about her that tells me we’d either love each other or absolutely hate each other. That and the glasses, I dunno, something about the glasses—”

“Good morning,” Erin says.

“Hm? Oh,” Hawkeye says, and goes to kiss the top of Erin’s head. “Good morning.”

“Where’s mine?” BJ teases.

“You're gonna have to come get it,” Hawkeye says, and BJ gets out of his chair and pecks Hawkeye on the lips once, twice, then goes to lean with him against the railing. “What'd I miss?”

“Nothing much,” BJ says, at the same time that Erin says, “Plans.”

And, of course, Hawkeye latches onto what Erin just said. “Plans?” he asks. “Plans for what?”

Erin seems to realize how much shit she’s gotten herself in, because she clears her throat. “Plans for the day. Going around town.”

“Agate Beach,” BJ says. “Whale watching, you know.”

Hawkeye looks between the two of them with suspicion. The one downside to BJ and Erin looking so similar is that they have the same tells, which Hawkeye can read like a copy of _Last of the Mohicans_. “If there's something going on, I’d like to know about it,” Hawkeye says.

“You’d be the first,” BJ tells him. 

Erin picks up the stack of playing cards and unwinds the rubber band. “Wanna play Screw You, Rat?” she asks, and Hawkeye pulls up a chair, and they settle down to play.

* * *

Back in time, it’s spring. Charles, a month into his tenure at the 4077th, tries to put on a production of _Much Ado About Nothing._ It all goes to hell as quick as things usually do around here, between the set not living up to the scenery, and Klinger fretting about making the costumes. They barely get anything done in rehearsals—Radar's not a very convincing Don John, and Mulcahy less so a Don Pedro. The whole production collapses in on itself.

Literally. They have to bug out mid-rehearsal.

"Clamp," BJ says. One falls into his hand. The makeshift hospital tent they've set up is already littered with dirty instruments and gloves. "It's a shame. I really do love his comedies."

"I know, the tragedies are all so drab and depressing," Hawkeye agrees. "We already have enough of that around here."

Charles sighs from his own table. "If you two hadn't ruined the entire production, perhaps you wouldn't be complaining."

Hawkeye looks up from the body below him. "It's not our fault Margaret couldn't make it to rehearsals. BJ was a hero for stepping in."

"And because of him, our Hero was without a Claudio," Charles argues. 

"We didn't even have a Hero yet, Charles," BJ says. "I was just talking to thin air." He looks over to Hawk. "Did make one hell of a Beatrice though, didn't I, Benedick?"

"With no sauce that can be devised to it, I protest I love thee," Hawkeye recites.

The lines come easy. "Why, then, God forgive me!"

"What offense, sweet Beatrice?" Hawkeye looks between him and the shrapnel he's extracting.

"You have stayed me in a happy hour: I was about to protest I loved you," BJ recites back, and tries not to think about the words.

Hawkeye breaks character, frowning and gesturing to the room. "You call this hour happy?"

"If I don't I'm afraid this will become a tragedy." There's blood pooling in the wound beneath him. "More suction."

The next few minutes are spent in relative silence, trying to work around nerves and muscle tissue. There's the clattering of shrapnel in specimen tins, the sound of artillery fire somewhere beyond the hills, and the shouts of men setting up their temporary camp. On the tables, soldiers wheeze through anesthesia.

"You know, in the original productions, the women were played by men," BJ says. He doesn't know why he says it. It scratches the itch.

"I'll make sure Klinger tailors a dress to your size for the next production, then," Charles says.

Hawkeye starts to sing a Dinah Shore song, or maybe it's Dinah Washington. BJ joins in, and they hum their little melodies against the starkness of the backdrop. More clattering, more bodies. 

Hours later, when all the blood has been washed off their hands, it’s midday. Their tent is only half set up, and the weather is stifling, so they decide to retrace their steps to a river they saw while bugging out. They pack up a cake tin from Peg, a jug of gin, their robes, the radio, and a chair each. They even manage to “lightly borrow” a Jeep for the journey.

They’re about to turn the key Margaret catches them. “Where do you two think you're going?"

"Vacation,” BJ says. “Lovely little place by the water."

"We spend our summers there,” Hawkeye says from the passenger seat. “You should come with."

Margaret puts her hands on her hips. "I have reports to do, and so do you. _And_ Charles still wants to do the play.”

“How can we? It’s a comedy and we’re in a warzone,” Hawkeye points out. “Unless he’s going for some experimental scenery.”

"Come on, Margaret,” BJ says. “it's been a long day of a long week of a long war. Have a little fun."

"We promise to make it worth your while,” Hawkeye adds with a sing-song.

Margaret stands there for one moment, two. She taps her foot and seems to be a bit at war with herself, face scrunching up before she sighs and lets her arms fall. "Okay."

Hawkeye blinks. "Wait, really?"

Margaret climbs into the backseat of the Jeep with a look of determination on her face. "Yes, really, now drive before I change my mind."

An hour later they’re lounging by the bank of the river. The sun beats down on the three of them—Margaret and BJ in chairs, and Hawkeye lying on his own robe between them. Margaret hasn’t spoken much—she mostly takes the time to either sit in the sun or walk ankle-deep into the river to stare it. Both BJ and Hawkeye have tried to ask her what’s wrong, but she tells them she’s trying to “concentrate on having fun”. In the distance, one can hear shelling. BJ prefers to listen to the river gliding through the rocks, or the wind in the trees.

From his place on the ground, Hawkeye turns to BJ and holds up his empty martini glass. “Oh garçon!” he says. “I need a refill.”

“I got the last two,” BJ says. “It’s your turn.”

Hawkeye grumbles and fights to make himself upright. BJ’s knees make good leverage, and when he finds himself standing, BJ holds out his own empty glass as well.

“Garçon?” he asks, grinning widely. Hawkeye swipes the martini glass and ambles over to the jug sitting snug against a rock, half-singing along to the radio.

“Could I have one as well?” Margaret asks.

“Only have the two glasses,” Hawkeye says as he pours him and BJ their drinks. “Unless you want to share one? I promise it’ll be served with tongue.”

Margaret groans and walks over to Hawkeye, taking the jug from him and going back to her chair. She looks at it, drinks from it, and winces.

“Everything okay, Margaret?” BJ asks.

“Of course everything is okay!” she snaps.

“The man asked you a simple question, Margaret, there’s no need to bite his head off,” Hawkeye says.

Margaret takes another sip from the jug. “I just think you should respect someone’s privacy, is all.”

BJ laughs out of astonishment. “Margaret, all you’ve done today is mope! Something’s obviously wrong, and you obviously want to talk about, so talk about it!”

In the bushes, the cicadas trill. Margaret taps the side of the jug. Hawkeye moves to give BJ his glass and stands next to him. They wait as Margaret opens her mouth, closes it, then opens it again. “BJ,” she says, “you’re in a happy marriage, right?”

The question throws him for a loop. “I mean,” he says, “I would like to think so.” Barring the general feelings for his best friend, and increasingly cryptic letters he’s been getting from Peg that involve a lot of dancing and her old friend Val. And also barring the war in general.

“So you know how it’s supposed to feel,” Margaret says, “when it’s going right? When someone loves you like they’re supposed to?”

“Margaret, what’s going on?” Hawkeye asks, voice soft.

She shakes her head, eyes glassy. She takes another sip from the jug. “Oh,” she says, “Oh, I don’t know. I don’t know!” She laughs, it seems, in spite of herself. “That’s the whole problem is that I don’t know! I don’t know what’s wrong with me and Donald but there’s something...something…” She shakes her head. “Even when we met it all just felt so convenient, you know? To be wanted? I could want someone if they wanted me. And I did, but…”

“But now you’re not so sure,” BJ finishes. “If it’s what you actually want.”

Margaret doesn’t look at either for them. BJ feels a strange moment of kinship, where he almost wants to take her hand and ask _Are you…?_ But that isn’t how the world works. Still, BJ can imagine, for a moment, that he and Margaret are on the same ship, trying to plug any and all sprung leaks. It’s a sinking ship, BJ realizes. It’s a sinking ship that neither of them can do anything about.

“I think we’re going to get a divorce,” she says, quietly. She sniffs and looks to the two of them. “Not right now, obviously. Maybe not even for a few months, or a year. But it’ll happen. It’ll happen and the one...one _shred_ of normalcy I had will be gone and I—I won’t be wanted, anymore.” She laughs again. “The way Donald talks to me, I’m not sure if I’m wanted now!”

“Hey, _hey_ now,” Hawkeye says, and swoops over to Margaret’s side. “That’s just not true. I want you every day of my life.”

Margaret snorts and looks at where he’s crouching. “You know what I mean.”

“What’s there to know? You’re a gorgeous young woman, anyone would go crazy over you!”

Margaret blinks. “Anyone?” she asks.

Hawkeye nods. “Anyone.” He looks to BJ, who nods.

“Anyone,” he says.

BJ watches as Hawkeye and Margaret look at each other. They’ve always been close in a way Hawkeye and BJ aren’t, but maybe that’s for the best. A look passes between the two of them, like what they’ve said has another meaning that no one’s articulating. Again, the question pops up in BJ’s head, the lingering _Hey, sorry to ask, but what do you mean by anyone? Are we all the same?_ It’s tempting, but it’s not the time to ask. It never is.

Margaret wipes a tear from her eyes and laughs. “Well,” she says, “I guess I’ll accept anyone. Even if it’s someone like you.”

Hawkeye puts on a show of mock offense before standing up. “It’s no matter,” he says. He swipes her jug of gin, which Margaret protests with a yell, and ambles over to where BJ is. “I will live in your heart, die in your lap, and be buried in your eyes,” he recites, sitting down between BJ’s legs and slinging an arm over one of his knees. “And what’s more—I’ll drink your liquor.”

“I don’t think that’s how it goes,” BJ says. Hawkeye does this at least once a week, especially if he gets drunk enough, but it never fails to catch BJ off guard. It’s so casually intimate that, for a second, BJ imagines them in these positions by a fire, in a warm home where there’s only the smell of old wood and the walls are decorated with art they love and pictures of them up the staircase. He imagines them with his fingers in Hawkeye’s hair, maybe reading to him.

The cicadas trill again, and the image fades. BJ doesn’t know where to put his hands except to keep them still, like any sudden movement is deadly.

“You’re disgusting,” Margaret says, but there’s no heat to it.

Hawkeye takes a sip from the jug and waves her off.

BJ laughs at the scene. “You and her are too wise to woo peaceably,” he quotes.

Hawkeye tilts his head back, and BJ tries very hard not to think about eye contact. “I don’t think that’s how it goes,” he says.

BJ shrugs. “You and _I_ are too wise to woo peaceably,” he corrects, and feels a thumping from his chest as Hawkeye looks at him a moment too long.

Hawkeye blinks and dips his head back down to view the river. “Close enough,” he says, just filler words probably, and they sit there watching the river, listening to the birds that haven’t flown from the shelling. A spot of paradise in the apocalypse, is what it is. BJ wishes the war could just be this, but he also knows this could never happen if it weren’t for the destruction happening beyond the hills. Hawkeye tilts his head back again, and without thinking, BJ brushes some dust from the top of his head.

He looks over to Margaret, who looks right back at him with a knowing smile. It’s...warm, which is uncommon for Margaret. BJ feels like he just got caught stealing for the cookie jar. Or kissing another boy on the lips. Little crimes. Margaret keeps smiling, and he doesn’t know if she knows, or if anyone here really knows, but there is an understanding. A sinking ship. If they had glasses to clink, he supposes they would do so. Instead, he just nods, and she nods back.

"I really needed this,” she says, closing her eyes and settling into her chair. She opens an eye. “Thank you, both."

Hawkeye raises the jug and leans further back into BJ. "We'll be here until the end of the war."

* * *

The seagulls are putting up a mighty racket, almost as if in competition with the waves. It’s cold, an early preview of the wetter, windier days of fall. Hawkeye likes those months—it reminds him of Maine a bit, so BJ can mind the weather for him. And he likes Agate Beach, for the lighthouse far in the distance and the way the rock piles tell the story of the tides. The two of them walk, buttoned up and making the occasional comment at a piece of beach debris or a ship on the horizon. Erin walks out ahead of them a few yards. Occasionally she’ll drop to the ground, fingers digging into the sand, before either throwing rocks out into the ocean or laughing and stuffing them in her pocket.

“Can you imagine if we took her here when she was a kid?” Hawkeye asks. “She would’ve gone bananas.”

“Her dresser would’ve been full of rocks,” BJ agrees. “She might’ve ended up a geologist.”

“Instead she’s a degenerate getting a degree in ethics,” Hawkeye says. He grins. “I’m so proud of her.”

And BJ smiles, too. He always knew Hawkeye would love Erin, and vice versa, but whenever he sees it in action it sparks something gold in him. Like the universe clicking together. “Two sets of degenerate parents raising a degenerate child,” he says. “Seems fitting.”

They walk for a little while longer along the beach. Erin occasionally comes back to them to talk and, reverting in the way all kids do when they visit home, handing Hawkeye and BJ agates when she runs out of pocket space. BJ can almost imagine that she’s small again until she pulls out her pack of cigarettes and lets one hang in her mouth as she continues to explore.

“Do you think she’s smoking to spite us?” BJ asks.

Hawkeye shrugs. “What would she have to spite us for? It’s—it’s rebellion, y’know. Proof she’s a person beyond us.”

BJ shakes his head. “I dunno, I—” He stops himself, because it seems stupid to say out loud. _I think she hates me because I wasn’t there those first few years_. As if she could remember any of it, or that she’d hate him at all for it when it’s a thing she’s only told in stories.

It takes BJ a couple steps to realize that Hawkeye’s stopped. He turns to see him standing there, hat on with his hands stuffed in his coat, with an incredulous look on his face, like he’s just read BJ’s mind. Maybe he has. “You, sir,” he says, “have an inferiority complex the size of Montana!”

BJ scoffs. “I do not!”

“You do! You do! Or need I remind you of the reunion?”

The unit had, about ten years ago, decided to do a little reunion in Ottumwa. Invites were sent out to anyone who had served, including Ugly John, Frank, and the famous—possibly infamous—Trapper. BJ had spent all of twenty minutes staring daggers into the back of the man’s head whenever they entered a conversation with him, until he actually took the time to listen to what he was saying. The guy was funny, and pretty, BJ had to admit. They ended up getting along swell enough considering one of them had wanted to cuss the other one out for over a decade. And, anyways, it was BJ’s hand Hawkeye took when the night ended, so he couldn’t complain. They still exchanged Christmas cards and the occasional gag gift that would arrive at an inconvenient time.

“Okay,” BJ admits. “Maybe I do.” He holds out a hand, and Hawkeye walks up to him, taking it, and they walk in stride. “You still love me, though.”

“No more than reason,” Hawkeye recites. “You?”

“No, no more than reason,” BJ says, and squeezes Hawkeye’s hand. 

They walk a little further down the beach, enjoying the scenery, and happy enough to find no reason to talk. This, BJ thinks, is the best part about knowing someone for so long. Most people would think you’ve run out of things to talk about, but they never really do. It’s just co-existing—no frills about it. No shows. It’s something that doesn’t come easy to either of them alone, but together it works. Erin continues to smoke up ahead as she crouches down among another pile of rocks.

“You know, it’s funny,” Hawkeye says. “I think I might be going crazy.” BJ frowns, and Hawkeye shakes his head. “Not—not _that_ level of crazy, but I swore I saw Margaret in town yesterday with Elaine.”

“Really?” BJ asks, panic rising in his throat.

“Yes, really! Right by the taffy shop. I would’ve walked right over, but Erin had her heart set on going whale watching so,” he says, and shrugs. BJ feels a moment of relief, and reminds himself to thank Erin later. “Might’ve been anyone blonde, now that I think about it. But it’s strange, isn’t it?”

“Very strange,” BJ says, trying to sound casual. In reality, he’s strung so tight he might be able to play music off of himself. He looks out to Erin and cups his hands, shouting, “Er-Bear! You want lunch?”

Erin extinguishes her cigarette on one of the wet stones and stands up. “I could eat,” she says.

Hawkeye side-eyes him. “This doesn’t have anything to do with yours and Erin’s ‘plans’ would it?”

“What would?” BJ asks. He gestures to the beach. “This is our plans.”

Hawkeye doesn’t buy it. “That won’t work. I’m covering up my bowl of chowder to make sure you two don’t slip anything into it.”

“Slip what into what?” Erin asks as she walks back up to them.

“Don’t give me the innocent act, little missy, I know you and your father like the backs of my hands,” Hawkeye says.

Erin gives BJ a look, but he shakes his head. Hawkeye thinking they’ve got some grand prank in the works isn’t too far off, but it’s still miles away from what they’ve been planning the past few months.

“Whatever you say, Hawk,” she says, and starts to walk back towards the car. BJ and Hawkeye turn to follow her.

“I’ll figure it out,” Hawkeye says. “I will.”

BJ smiles and shakes his head. “Whatever you say, Hawk.”

* * *

“Oh, I’m sure he doesn’t suspect anything,” Margaret says over the phone. “He doesn’t have any reason to believe I’m here.”

BJ shakes his head. Down the hallway, the sweet tones of the Chordettes seem to fill the walls, as does Hawkeye and Erin’s butchered attempt at harmonizing. The weather had turned on them halfway through the day, as it was wont to do here, and they’d settled for a night consisting of TV and soup. BJ hears the rain on the rooftop and hopes it won’t be here tomorrow.

“That is true, but,” BJ says, “maybe keep it down for the next day or so? Lay low? And spread the word about it.”

There’s a pause. “You want us to all lock ourselves in our hotel rooms for 24 hours.”

BJ winces. “When you put it like that—”

“There’s sights to see! We didn’t fly all the way over here to look at the ocean from our room. I wanna see the town! I wanna—wanna walk on the sand! If I’m staying here I might as well enjoy it. And so should Elaine! And so should everybody else.”

BJ rubs his forehead. “You’re right,” he says. “You’re right. Forget I said anything.”

“BJ,” Margaret says. “It’s going to be fine.”

“Of course it is,” BJ says. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

Down the hall, something gets knocked over, and there’s a mad dash of shushing and whispering. They still think he’s in the bathroom. BJ, nervous, pulls out a photo from the back of his pocket, of him and Hawkeye, utterly blitzed at Rosie’s. BJ’s still fresh-faced in uniform, mud and blood and guts smeared on his skin. He’s got his arm around Hawkeye, and they’re laughing in the corner booth. He thinks maybe Rosie took it, or maybe she had Radar take it. Something about them being a sight for sore eyes, and her not having a mirror. He must’ve sent it to Peg during the early days, in between the surgery and the booze, and promptly forgotten about it. He looks to the back, reads the date, and reads Peg’s handwriting underneath: “Found this in the back of the closet. You two look so young!” She sent him the photo five months ago.

“It’s going to be fine,” Margaret repeats. It’s not the swift ‘cut the crap’ she’d give if it were Hawkeye saying this, but then again him and Margaret have never had that kind of rapport. Her and Hawkeye are so alike in their personalities, bouncing off each other like two identical magnetic poles, but her and BJ are alike in the kind of expectations they had set on them, and the kind of realizations they’ve had to have. BJ thinks back to the river, and the sinking ship he imagined them on back then. Now, twenty years later, they’ve each gotten themselves a whole new boat.

“Thanks,” BJ says, sighing. 

They chat a little more about the details for tomorrow—where to go, when to go, before hanging up and rejoining the two in the living room. It’s bathed in warm orange light. There’s a fire, but it’s dwindling low and in need of newspapers. Sammy Kaye is playing low. Erin is perusing through a couple records as Hawkeye lounges on the couch reading _MAD_ magazine. One of the little wood sculptures on their coffee table is leaning against itself.

“Did I miss anything?” BJ asks, going to sit on the opposite end of the couch. 

Hawkeye, without looking up from his magazine, moves to lay down, feet in BJ’s lap, and readjusts his glasses. “Nothing much,” he says. “Cary Grant and Russell Moore stopped by for a nightcap, but ended up leaving early to avoid the traffic.”

“Damn!” BJ says, snapping his fingers. “I suppose Elizabeth Taylor made an appearance as well?”

“Oh, sure,” Hawkeye says. “She’s the one who broke the wood fox Peg and Val gave us in ‘68.”

“Is she now?” BJ asks.

“Well, you know what the papers say about her being a homewrecker and all,” Hawkeye says, and BJ laughs as he leans over Hawkeye’s legs for a medical journal.

The record stops, and Erin exchanges it for another one. As the static flows through the speaker, she sits down in the reading chair with _Crises of the Republic_ by Hannah Arendt and curls up into it. Outside, the rain pours down, and the trees scratch against the windows.

 _I’m making believe that you’re in my arms, though I know you’re so far away_ , sings the record, voice crooning and resting in the room like a blanket.

BJ looks to Hawkeye, who looks over the top of his magazine. A memory flits between them for a moment, producing soft smiles, and they go back to their reading, bathing in the orange glow.

* * *

Back in time, it’s the dead of summer. Everything is drenched in sweat—even food trays have a sheen to them, seemingly trying to expel years worth of deeply ingrained grease. BJ lies back on his cot. The sun’s already heading toward the hills, thank god, so he and Hawkeye bask in the coolness from their respective beds, hands on their stomachs, trading fantasies. Charles, in his corner, eats a can of caviar with mild interest.

"Tell me another one," BJ says.

"Okay, okay," Hawkeye says. "You're on a lone island, far from civilization. You've washed up from a shipwreck, and your clothes are all torn. The wind blows in your hair, sunlight shining on your face. In the distance, you can see another body—"

"An alive one, I hope,” BJ jokes.

"Of course!” Hawkeye dismisses with a wave. “And if not, I'll give my own, tax free. You stumble across the sand, trying to reach out. You get there to find—"

Radar knocks on the door. Both of them crane their necks and then fall back in unison, a “come in!” coming from either one or both of them. It’s hard to tell at this point. Either way, Radar enters the Swamp, surveying the situation and, rightly so, putting on a hesitant air for the benefit of all involved.

"Mail call, sirs," he says. "Uh, package for Winchester."

Charles's face lights up from his desk. "Ah, my records from Honoria! Hand it over."

"I can't wait to hear what those crazy kids have been listening to," Hawkeye says, looking to BJ. Where else could he look anyway?

"Bing Crosvinski," BJ offers, looking right back.

"I heard Leonard Bernstein might be collaborating with Tony Bennett," Hawkeye riffs, hand cupping his mouth in a conspiratorial gesture. "I also heard he might be making music with him."

"Will you two shut up?" Charles snaps, and grabs the package from Radar's hands.

BJ frowns. "I thought Leonard Bernstein married?"

Hawkeye sighs. "They all do, in the end."

BJ fights the funny feeling in his stomach and sits up. No one's looking at him but he can still feel eyes boring into the back of his head. They might be his own. "Any for me, Radar?"

Radar gives them over without looking up. "Three for Hunnicutt," he says, and pulls out a last batch of letters. "And two for Captain Pierce from Crabapple Cove, and uh, one with no return address on it."

"It's MacArthur, I'm sure of it," Hawkeye tells him, taking the letters. "He's finally responded to my letters and is going to give me an armistice for my birthday."

"My mom sent me over a box of her snickerdoodles for mine," Radar supplements. 

From outside, there's a ruckus. The news that there's mail seems to have spread quick, because there's a mob growing by the Colonel's office. A couple of profanities get thrown out, and Radar turns towards the noise.

"Ah geez," he says. "I better go before they start breaking down the doors like they did the last time." He pushes through the door. "Wait your turn, I'm comin'!"

The next few minutes rove around relative silence within the tent, barring a few rustled pieces of paper and the occasional humming. BJ recounts a story from Peg about Erin sticking a cherry pit up her nose. He doesn't recount the one Peg tells about how, during a weekend where her parents had the baby, she invited her friend Val over to dance. "It feels nice just to have someone moving by your side, y'know? I'd missed it," she writes. "We danced for hours. We could've won competitions." It strikes somewhat odd to him, like she’s trying to tell him something. He recalls the letters he’s sent about Hawkeye, and feels...recognition? He’s not sure.

On the other side of the line, Hawkeye tears open the unaddressed envelope and reads. His smile widens, and he seems to be reading with hungry eyes.

"Now I know that can't be from MacArthur," BJ says.

Hawkeye looks up from the letter. "If it was, there’d be a whole new meaning to 'This Man's Army'. It's a love letter."

"Really?" BJ asks. He ducks under the clothesline to perch on the chair. "What's it say?"

Hawkeye hands it over. "Read it for yourself," he says. BJ takes it and reads one line to himself before Hawkeye swats him. “Out loud!”

“Why?” BJ asks with a laugh.

"What can I say? Something about your Bay Area timbre gives me the warm and fuzzies," he says. 

There's an edge to his voice that BJ doesn't fully understand. Still, he clears his throat, and starts over.

"Dear Hawkeye," BJ reads aloud. Hawkeye lays back down in his cot. "Let me start off by saying the sight of you at the O Club tonight was something to behold. From the way you—" His mind catches on the signature at the bottom. Could be a woman’s name, but—

"Come on," Hawkeye says. He seems to be melting into his cot. "You haven't even gotten to the good part yet.”

BJ prides himself on his poker face, but even this is a worthy hurdle to overcome. He clears his throat and continues reading, sparing glances at Hawk.

"—From the way you moved to the sound of your voice, I couldn't stop looking at you," he says, and Hawkeye grins lazily. "You'd tip your head back and all I could think was all the ways I could kiss your throat." Hawkeye hums, long and low. "It drove me crazy, the things I imagined I would do to make you sound so sweet." 

"Making me sound sweet already," Hawkeye remarks.

BJ pointedly tries to not latch onto that. He fails, badly, but no one seems to notice. "I'm going crazy all over again writing them out," he says. And then, lower. "If you want to go crazy with me, meet me in the stock room tonight at 8. Bring records, maybe we’ll dance some if we’ve got the time. With all my love, Jamie."

BJ tries to bite down the utterly horrible mix of jealousy and arousal that's seeming to cloud the whole tent. Hawkeye’s bragged about his prowess before but this seems...different. Maybe it’s the name. Maybe it’s the image of a man making Hawkeye sound sweet.

And Hawkeye looks—well, if BJ knew those words could make him look that blissed out, it's all he'd say for the rest of time. They'd become his entire vocabulary.

"Steamy, right?" Hawkeye asks.

"Surprised I haven't burned my hands yet," BJ mumbles distantly.

"What records should I bring?" Hawkeye asks.

"Hm?" BJ asks.

"What records? I should bring some, if we’re gonna dance. And even if we don’t, it’ll be better to mask any noise not up to army standards.”

BJ just laughs. "I couldn't tell ya, Hawk." He continues to look at the letter. Bits of images keep flying at him—Hawkeye in the store room. Hawkeye on the mattress in the store room, melting like he just did. Hawkeye making noise.

A pair of fingers snaps in front of him. "Hey!" Hawkeye snatches the letter back. "Enough of that for you. Need I remind you that you're a married man?"

BJ's about to say something—a joke, an objection, a declaration, it's hard to tell when he opens his mouth—but is quickly interrupted by Charles turning in his chair, letter from Honoria still in his hands.

"Would you mind discussing that filth elsewhere?" he asks.

"Why?” Hawk asks, twisting towards Charles. “We're already covered in filth, and so's the bed. It adds to the scenery."

"There's no scenery," Charles argues. "There isn't even a stage."

"All the world's a stage," BJ chimes in.

"And all the men and women merely players," Hawkeye finishes. "You play your part over there and we'll do ours over here."

Charles huffs and tears at his package. Hawkeye rereads the letter again, on his side with a hand cradling his head, with BJ peering over this shoulder, trying not to lean in too close.

“Oh, _no_ ,” comes a voice. BJ looks up to see Charles staring at the opened package.

“What happened, Charles?” he asks. “Did someone die?”

“He’s grieving over the lost inheritance money,” Hawkeye says.

Charles frowns. “Will you two shut up?” He picks up a piece of paper, reads it, then goes back to the package. “A most horrible thing has occurred.”

For a moment, a wave of worry passes over the two of them. Charles is...Charles, definitely, but compared to Frank he’s almost downright tolerable. And he doesn’t mind a good practical joke. BJ might even call him a friend, if Charles would allow him to.

“What is it?” Hawkeye asks, voice soft.

“My sister, Honoria,” he says, with halting words, “has decided to send me _popular_ music.” He spits out the word like it’s just asked him to vote Democrat.

Hawkeye gets up from his bed. “Charles! Fuck, we thought maybe something tragic happened!”

Charles looks up. “Don’t you see? This is tragic! My dear, dear sister getting lost in the plebian tastes of today’s ‘music’! Next she’ll be asking me to read Raymond Chandler and do the Lindy.”

“Oh, the tragedy of that,” BJ says.

Hawkeye goes over and swipes the record from Charles’s hands. “Ella Fitzgerald,” he reads, pacing around the room as he does. BJ puts his hands behind his head and enjoys the show of Hawkeye making himself take up as much space as possible. “Ethel Merman, Peggy Lee, Perry Como.” He looks back to Charles. “You’re right. Utter trash.”

“Reprehensible,” BJ adds. 

Charles is about to retort when Kellye comes through the door. “Major Winchester,” she says, voice tired, “Sergeant Beaumont’s requested you. Something about a reading hour?”

Charles’s face lights up. “Oh! Oh, yes, I’d forgotten the time!” He chuckles, and picks up a book from his desk—BJ’s only able to make out “The Importance of” before the spine disappears into Charles’s jacket pocket. He stands, and looks to the two of them. “Don’t touch anything,” he says. He takes the record right back from Hawkeye’s hands. “ _Anything_.”

BJ holds his hands up in surrender. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

Hawkeye does the same. “These fingers have never been less sticky.”

Charles grimaces. "Gentlemen," he says, with no courtesy behind it, and follows a tired Kellye out the door.

Hawkeye sets about choosing an outfit and combing his hair. BJ finds himself wrapped up in deciphering Peg’s letters. In the increasing time he’s been at war, they’ve become as much about Val as his letters have been about Hawkeye. And the language...he feels like she’s trying to tell him something, but it’s always skirting around the edges of it. He supposes he’s doing the same.

Around him, Hawkeye frets. He combs his hair three times over, and practically walks all over the furniture as he watches the clock tick down. BJ watches as he goes over to Charles’s new records and files through them. He pulls out an Ink Spots album and sets it in the record player. The needle drops onto static for a bit before the first song plays.

“Romantic,” BJ says. “It’ll be perfect for her.”

Hawkeye doesn’t look at him, and hesitates for a moment. “Yeah,” he says. “Don’t know how well it’ll go. Truth be told, I’m two left feet.”

“Really?” BJ asks. “I never noticed.”

“Yeah, the doctors almost brought me on tour as a baby,” Hawkeye jokes, but BJ watches as nerves seem to crawl their way along the balls of his feet, the tips of his fingers. He sets the letter down. He wants to comfort Hawkeye, wants to smooth away the worry lines on his forehead with his thumb. Instead, he does something just as stupid.

“You could always practice,” BJ suggests.

“With who?” Hawkeye asks.

BJ shrugs. “Who else? I’m quite the dancer, I’ll have you know.” He stands up, hands in his pockets. He stands a little wider, as if standing straighter will make him seem more like a guy who’s trying to help a friend out, and not a flaming homosexual who wants someone moving at his side. “It’ll help your nerves.”

Hawkeye laughs. “I’m not so sure about that,” he jokes. “Besides, my two left feet with your two big ones. We’ll be quite a sight.”

“When are we ever not a sight?” BJ asks. “Come on. I’d be happy to help.”

Hawkeye nods, and they get into position. There’s no hesitancy on BJ’s part—if he pretends it’s normal, it’ll be normal. Hesitating means thinking, means wanting. Instead, BJ barrels through it. There’s a moment where their hands fumble to get into their correct positions, but eventually it ends up with one of his hands on Hawkeye’s waist, and the other in between the other man’s fingers. The Ink Spots croon as they take their first few steps.

“What are you teaching me again?” Hawkeye asks.

BJ wonders the same thing. “Waltz,” he lies.

“I don’t recall the waltz needing this much swaying,” Hawkeye jokes.

“It’s a special waltz,” BJ jokes. “Known only to San Francisco.”

Hawkeye smiles. “Is that so?”

BJ nods. “Very in fashion on the West Coast, you know.” They rock back and forth around the center pole, occasionally knocking into a foot locker or someone’s bed. They’ll have bruises on their calves and shins, come the morning. They’ll take forever to heal. A thought strikes BJ. “Shouldn’t we reverse the roles?”

“I learn best through observation,” Hawkeye quips, and his grasp on BJ’s shoulder goes tighter. BJ allows his fingers to dig a little deeper into Hawkeye’s hip. It’s a tightrope balance he’s walking on. Anything too much or too less and he thinks Hawkeye will find him out.

At this time of night, just when the sun has set, the overhead lamps turn on. In the tent it’s still mostly dark, save the reading lamp by BJ’s cot. Occasionally they slip through soft patches of light, dissolved by the mosquito mesh, but mostly they stay in the blue twilight, where both of their faces seem half-obscured.

The album, already on the next song, sings through fuzzy speakers. _And here in the gloom of my lonely room, we’re dancing like we used to do. Making believe is just another way of dreaming, so ‘til my dreams come true…_

In the dark, BJ can feel Hawkeye’s chest against his own. If anybody sees them, they’ll chalk it up to be a joke. They’re them, after all. Even for BJ, whose heart is pounding a mile a minute, he feels like the punchline is going to come ripping out of one of their mouths any minute now. They’ve got a few minutes, though. At least until the end of the song. In the dark, BJ looks down at Hawkeye and smiles softly. In a trick of the light, he thinks he sees Hawkeye smiling back. 

They sway there for a while, in this little world they’ve created for the two of them. The song starts to reach its end. _I’ll whisper goodnight, turn off the light and kiss my pillow, making believe it’s you._ The instrumentals start to fade out. BJ keeps his hand on Hawkeye’s waist. Hawkeye keeps his hand on BJ’s shoulder. Their palms are sweating. The next song filters in, and they continue swaying.

“You’ll be late for your date,” BJ says, though it pains him to say it.

“I’m sure she won’t mind,” Hawkeye says, simply. He looks around. “It’s a good thing your wife isn’t here to see us,” Hawkeye continues. “Other woman, and all that.”

BJ laughs. “I’m sure she won’t mind,” he parrots back.

“Sure, you _say_ that,” Hawkeye jokes. “But come the end of the movie I’ll have a shotgun wound and she’ll be in jail.”

“And where will I be?” BJ asks.

“On a deserted island,” says Hawkeye. “I told you so, earlier.”

“Indeed you did.” They sway a little more, and nearly knock into the pole. “We should probably stop dancing at some point,” BJ adds. They still haven’t stopped looking at each other in the dark.

“Yeah,” Hawkeye says distantly. “Yeah, we should.”

BJ readjusts their held hands. In a moment of weakness, he allows his thumb to brush over Hawkeye’s knuckles. He can’t tell if he’s feeling or hoping to feel the brush he gets back.

“Why waste a record though?” Hawkeye asks. “Especially if it means pissing Charles off.”

BJ shakes his head with a smile. “You know, you are so right.”

“I usually am.” One step, two step. Are they even doing a dance anymore? It’s hard to say.

“So I see the body,” BJ says. “I reach out, only to find—”

Hawkeye laughs. “See, this is the good part. It’s Ava Gardner,” he says, and weaves a tale of survival and espionage. Nothing comes of BJ and Ava—she’s a notorious flirt, but her love for BJ is so large she’s nearly paralyzed by it. All they get is a brief holding of hands when their ships go their separate ways.

BJ listens rapturously, hand still on Hawkeye’s back, Hawkeye’s fingers still grasping his shoulder. The record plays on.

* * *

In the half-dark of morning, BJ opens the blinds. It’s foggy out, but the fog rests differently up here than it did in San Francisco. There, fog was something you lived with day in and day out. It was a bustling city, after all, you couldn’t let a little fog stop you. Here, though, it seems to halt everything in its tracks. A few elderly couples walk up the roads, a few cars, but nobody really gets started on anything until the sun comes up and everything burns off. Here in the neighborhood, it combs its fingers through every nook and cranny. In the soft blue light of a sun just about to rise, BJ can barely see the ocean. He grins, and goes to sit on the bed, balancing a cup of coffee in each hand.

Hawkeye, sensing the disturbance, bolts up from bed, eyes wide. BJ sets one of the cups down on the nightstand and runs a hand up and down Hawkeye’s back and neck, until his breathing slows and he seems to take in his surroundings. He grips the sheets and quilt once, and the fight seems to go out of him.

“Which one was it?” BJ asks softly.

“The one with the roads,” Hawkeye says, his voice rough with sleep. It’s a common one: Hawkeye driving a Jeep, trying to get to the 4077th, but they keep taking the wrong turn. Sometimes he has someone wounded in the back with him, other times he’s trying to get to someone. And, in the worst ones, he takes a turn and hits somebody, or topples over and kills the guy in the back, or he crashes through the wall of the O Club. “Some kid from Texas...I remember his face but not his name, I…” He seems to notice BJ, then, reality finally slipping back into place. “What are you doing up?”

BJ leans back and hands Hawkeye’s cup of coffee over to him. “Making coffee,” he says.

Hawkeye nods, head still halfway between sleep and wakefulness, and takes a slip. Then, waking up fully, frowns at it, and goes to look at the clock. “Beej, it’s six in the morning!” he says, setting the cup down.

“I know,” he says. In truth, he’s been up most of the night. If he’d laid in bed any longer he would’ve gone crazy. “I have a special day planned, and I wanted to wake you up in a special way.”

Hawkeye blinks. “If you wanted to wake me up in a special way, I can give you a few other ideas.”

BJ snorts and puts his own cup down. “I thought about that,” he says, “but I didn’t want you to wake up screaming.” He looks to the one hand of Hawkeye’s still grasping the bedsheets, which loosens immediately.

Hawkeye clicks his tongue. “See, I don’t think that bodes well for our sex life,” he jokes. He’s still breathing heavy. BJ files a hand around the hairs at the nape of his neck and watches the man melt a little bit into it.

“Okay,” BJ says, and shuffles a little closer. He smooths some of the worry lines on Hawkeye’s face, and a couple new ones he’d picked up in the years passing. He leans in and kisses him, soft and slow, tasting of black coffee and morning breath. “How about this, then?” he asks in between kisses. “I think it bodes a little better.”

Hawkeye laughs low, falling back onto the bed. BJ follows, the laughter bubbling and bouncing between both of their chests, still quiet as the birds outside chatter about the sun filtering through the morning fog. 

What follows is thirty minutes of lazy morning sex, interspersed with the occasional in-joke and reference that can only come from other, more hilarious bouts of morning sex from times past. What follows after that is five minutes of half-garbled pillow talk, interspersed with a simple lying-in and listening to the birds. Now, though, they sit in their robes on the kitchen counter. They barely use the stools, unless they’re in the kind of company that calls for that sort of thing. They sit side by side, eating bowls of cereal and passing toast from one person to another. BJ gets crumbs on his mustache and Hawkeye brushes them off, calling it disgusting while he’s got beard burn glowing red on a corner of his mouth.

“So, are you gonna tell me why we’re up at the crack of dawn?” Hawkeye asks. “Not that I’m complaining.”

BJ shrugs and sips on his coffee. “I thought we might leave a note for Erin and go for a little road trip.”

“And where would we going on this little road trip?” Hawkeye asks, a smile forming on the corner of his lip.

BJ waves a finger. “Ah, see, that’s a surprise, darling.”

The smile spreads from corner to corner. “When do we head out?”

“Whenever we’re ready, I suppose. I give us an hour.”

“An hour to live?” Hawkeye jokes, putting a hand on his heart.

“An hour to get ready,” BJ says.

“Oh, good,” Hawkeye sighs. “I don’t know what I would do if I had an hour to live.”

“What would you do?” BJ asks.

Hawkeye pauses, thinks about, and nods his head to the side. “Probably get ready with you,” he says, voice spilling out a kind of quiet sincerity. Then, pointing a finger, “but don’t tell the other kids that, they’ll think I’m some sort of sentimental schmuck. Tell them it’d be climbing Mt. Everest. Or swimming the Channel.”

BJ chuckles, chest warm. “I’ll just tell them you spent your last hour doing what you loved.”

“You?” Hawkeye says, and he’s already laughing at his own joke. BJ’s chuckle grows into a full out gasp. “I did that already!”

They pack light. Sandwiches—turkey and roast beef—a tin of potato chips, the map book, and a change of shoes. Hawkeye pulls on a crimson fisherman’s sweater and an old yellow mackintosh that seems to have weathered so much of Maine’s weather in its early years that nothing fazes it. BJ pulls on an old blue sweater, still too large for him, the patterns mismatched and stray puts of yarn poking out of the front and sleeves. Over that he puts his own beige raincoat. Two and a half hours later, BJ waits in the car while Hawkeye throws their things in the back.

“My mother always told me not to get in cars with strange men,” Hawkeye says when he sits down in the passenger seat.

“So did mine,” BJ says. “I think it turned out well for me.”

Hawkeye laughs, his face softening down into something more inquisitive. “Why all this today?”

“Can’t I just be spontaneous?” BJ says. Hawkeye doesn’t buy it. 

He wants so badly to tell him, to spoil it. He’s wanted to for _months_ , but he can’t. He can’t, that’s the very nature of a surprise. It kills him a bit, but he knows it’ll be worth it. “I’ll tell you when we get there, how about that?” And he gives a look, and he hopes Hawkeye can take that promise for now.

Hawkeye looks at him, then looks out the windshield. “Carry on, Jeeves,” he says, with a flick of his wrist, and they’re off.

* * *

On their last night in Korea, Hawkeye and BJ get as drunk as they’ve ever been. It’s saying something, considering how drunk they’ve been before, but there was always surgery on the horizon. You could get pissed, but just pissed enough that you’d be fine to go an hour later. Now there’s no more wounded. There’s no more _war_. BJ’s going home tomorrow—for real, this time. And he’s got Hawkeye in his arms, and they’re stumbling blindly through the compound like they’re in a pinball machine. 

They’ve traded hats at some points in the past hour or so, going between fits of laughing and trying not to throw up on each other’s shoes. BJ holds Hawkeye’s cowboy hat to his chest. Hawkeye wears BJ’s hat at a tilt. The Swamp lies ahead of them. Instead of pushing the door open, they barrel into it, spilling into the tent like a deluge.

“The war’s over!” BJ announces to nobody. He trips over a freshly packed footlocker and knocks into the stove He hisses out of instinct, and finds Hawkeye next to him, a concerned look on his face. BJ’s too drunk to feel the bruise growing on his knee, and smiles. “The war’s over!” he repeats.

Hawkeye laughs affectionately. “The war’s over!” he says. “God it’s been so long, but here we are. Who would’ve thunk it, us two crazy kids? We’ll come back and they’ll expect army-made men, and they’ll get army mad men instead.” They hold onto each other by their shirt sleeves, leaning against the tent pole. Hawkeye grins, and BJ grins back. “I mean, I mean look at you! Look at you!”

“Why?” BJ asks, frowning. “What’s wrong with me?”

“Nothing, just look at you!” Hawkeye says, hitting BJ in the chest with his hand. “If you’d have told me, on that long, hot day in May that mister captain’s bars, newly pressed an’ minted out of Kimpo would be you in however many years I wouldn’t have believed you!”

BJ frowns deeper. “May? I arrived in October.”

“In what world did you come here in October? No, I remember it clear as day. It was—it was summer, when you arrived. Wait, no, that’s not right.”

BJ points and giggles. “Told you! October!”

“No, no, the sun was out!” Hawkeye protests. He leans in closer, so much BJ can smell the alcohol on his breath. “Wasn’t it warm?”

BJ, flooded with affection and gin, says, “I don’t remember. All I remember is you.” It should feel dangerous to say, but it’s dark here, and—and there’s something about Hawkeye, lately. He keeps thinking about what he said earlier in the day. _What would you do if I was dying? Hold me and let me die in your arms or just let me lay there and bleed?_ He wants to say, _I’d rub your back and run your fingers through your hair. I’d return the favor._

Hawkeye’s smile fades into something more sarcastic, and he pushes from the tent pole. “You flatter me,” he says, voice all sardonic. He turns on the light and sits down, undoing his boots.

“No, really!” BJ insists. He looks away and starts to undo his own boots, but can’t quite grasp the laces. “All I’ve got from that day is your face an’ your hand on my forehead. Everything else is...is gravy.” He makes a grab for his laces, but the world tilts and he ends up falling towards his cot. “Dammit.”

Hawkeye giggles and throws one boot into the air, then two. “Call me turkey,” he says.

BJ struggles onto his cot, and lays down. He gazes wistfully at the canvas. It’s the last time he’ll see it. “Turkey,” he says. “God, can you imagine the turkey dinners, once we’re home? With, with mashed potatoes, an’ green bean casserole?” His stomach grumbles. He imagines fancy dinners with Hawkeye—dinner parties they prepare for their friends, the two of them fretting between the kitchen and the table, arguing over family recipes. The smell of fresh sage and rosemary floating through the household, both of them too hot from standing over the stove. He imagines them both rolling up their sleeves and taking their turns with the dishes—Hawkeye washing, BJ drying, trading idle chatter about the dinner and their guests, voices hushed. 

“An’ leftovers!” he says, the fantasy spilling out of his mouth. “Leftovers for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.” He waits for a response, but finds nothing but crickets, and the occasional distant cheer from the mess tent. When he turns his head, he sees Hawkeye sitting with his head down, lost in shadow. “What’s wrong?”

When Hawkeye looks up, his eyes are glassy, but he’s got a smile on his face. “The war’s over,” he says with a shrug, but then frowns and waves it off. “Or, no—no, I’m happy the war’s over. I’m over the _moon_ the war is over, I feel like, like I can breathe a little bit finally, but.” And then the act drops, and he looks devastated. “We’re never going to see each other again.”

BJ shakes his head. “Sure we will,” he says. “I’ll—”

“Come over to dinner one year, yeah,” Hawkeye finishes. “And you’ll call me once a month by phone, or I’ll call you, and that’s not counting all the letters. And it’ll feel normal. That’s what old army buddies do, y’know? You call, you write, but you don’t really see each other, because there’s nothing that needs to be said face-to-face like, like…” He looks through the mesh of the tent, like it holds an answer for him. “I love you’s,” he says, voice low. BJ’s heart quickens. “Or goodbyes. And when you do come over for dinner, there’ll be the promise of doing it again sometime, but we won’t.” He shakes his head. “We won’t! We’ll just keep saying we will, and then we’ll fall behind on the phone calls, and then the letters.” 

He stares at some undetermined spot in front of him, face blank. “And we’ll fade into each other’s backgrounds,” he sighs, “just...stories, that we tell other people.” He looks BJ in the eye. “It’s a fate worse than death, Beej, but it’s coming, and neither of us can stop it.”

“You can’t say that for sure,” BJ says. He feels like the alcohol’s been sucked out of him. “You don’t know.”

“Don’t I?” Hawkeye asks. “You share a tent with a guy for so long, you’d think it’d be different.” 

The name neither of them are saying hangs in the air. When BJ was in high school he'd gone to the yearly talent show, where one kid had done magic tricks. There were a lot of pyrotechnics involved, and it was a sight to behold. Colors everywhere. It also, in the last minute of the act, set someone's hair on fire. As they doused the flames, all BJ could think was _I would hate to be the guy who had to follow that._

And now, here he is, and he’s done the same thing all over again. Nobody likes a copycat.

“Hawk—” BJ says. He doesn’t know whether what’s going to come out is an apology or an admission.

“No, it’s fine,” Hawkeye says, waving it off. “Really, it’s fine. We meet on a goodbye, we end on a goodbye. Goodbye is fitting for us.”

He looks so sad, BJ doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t know how to fix this. Another realization, another itch starts to scratch at his brain. Something is starting to point out the obvious.

“What about the clock tower?” he asks, not wanting to give up the point.

Hawkeye blinks, taken aback. “What?”

“Grand Central, the clock tower!” BJ says, as if a one-off joke made ages ago will spring magically from Hawkeye’s mind. “Dancing! We have our promises to keep.”

“And many miles to go before we sleep,” Hawkeye says, but there’s recognition there.

“Sleep perchance to—to dream,” BJ replies. “We can still dream. We’ve still got the clock tower.”

Hawkeye smiles, but it almost looks like pity. Like BJ doesn’t know what he’s saying. “I’ve still got the clock tower, Beej,” he says. “You’ve got Peg and Erin.” He shakes his head. “Listen, I’m drunk and—and morose. Let’s go to sleep.” He turns off the light, and there’s the sound of bedsprings creaking. 

For a minute, BJ swims drunkenly in his own bed. He almost stews in it. Because Hawkeye’s right, a bit. Not about not seeing each other again—BJ won’t allow that. He’ll hitchhike across America if he needs to. But he’s still married. The world they’re going back to is going to be far less horrific than the one they're leaving, but that doesn’t mean it won’t bring it’s own little horrors. 

BJ can’t _do_ anything about that, though. Not yet, anyway. So, instead, he goes to the chair by Hawkeye’s bed, and turns on the light.

Hawkeye blinks away the brightness and cranes his neck to look at BJ. “What the hell are you doing?”

He shrugs. “I can’t let you go to sleep miserable, I’m sorry.”

“What are you going to do, read me a bedtime story and kiss me goodnight?” Hawkeye says sarcastically.

It’s an easy joke to fall into. BJ resists the temptation. “Would you mind if I did?” he asks, voice low.

Hawkeye blinks, and BJ watches the sarcasm slough off his face. Maybe it’s because they’re both drunk. Maybe it’s because they’re both tired. Maybe...maybe it’s something that makes BJ’s chest want to explode. He’s not going to read into it. He’s not going to have this night ruined any further. “No,” Hawkeye says. “No, I wouldn’t.”

It’s not the answer BJ expected. He looks around Hawkeye’s shelves and finds them all empty. Right. They’re all packed up to go. “Um. Okay, I don’t...I don’t have any stories, actually. You know all of them.”

“Tell me something thas’ not a story, then,” Hawkeye slurs, settling into his pillow.

BJ thinks for a bit, then nods. “Okay,” he says. “When I was in high school, I got this poetry book from the library. Read it like crazy. I checked it out over and over again. The librarian nearly gave it to me as a Christmas present. I think I still have one poem memorized, sorta. I mean, just the bits I liked. It runs long”

“Mmph,” Hawkeye hums, which BJ translates into _Enough with the exposition, tell me already._

“I’m going to butcher it,” BJ warns.

“How does it go?”

BJ glances between his own lap and Hawkeye looking up at him. “ _Lay your sleeping head, my love, human on my faithless arm_ ,” he recites. He tries to find the next few lines, but draws a blank. “ _Let the living creature lie, mortal, guilty, but to me—_ ” He swallows. Hawkeye’s still looking at him. “ _—to me the entirely beautiful._ ” He watches as Hawkeye’s eyes blink slower and slower, filled with...no, BJ can’t hope for that. He should be thankful he’s allowed this much. “ _Soul and body have no bounds: to lovers as they lie upon her tolerant enchanted slope in their ordinary swoon._ ”

Hawkeye’s asleep now. BJ, despite the surgery and alcohol, feels wide awake. He feels like he can do dangerous things now, like brushing the hair out of Hawkeye’s eyes. Like kissing his forehead. He does just that.

“ _Nights of the insult let you pass_ ,” he recites. “ _Watched by every human love_.”

He watches as Hawkeye’s breathing evens out. He wants so badly to wake him up, to say _I may be reading into this, but._ To...to prove something. If he’s going to say goodbye, he wants to leave him with something more than words in the air. But now’s not the time.

Unable to stand the tent anymore, BJ gets up and wanders around the base. There’s the bright glow of the mess tent, where a couple people are still leaning on each other, telling stories of here and of home. There’s still the faint trace of smoke from the forest fire. It reminds BJ of those hot, hot summers, where there would be days you could mistake the smoke for the fog, ash for snow. There’s burn marks on the floodlights. In a few days time, the whole camp will be taken down. All that will be left will be burnt tent poles and patches in the grass. And over the years, it’ll be like they were never there at all. But they were.

BJ is overcome with a sudden feeling of mourning. He expects it. This was his home for so long, after all. But he’s got a new home to look forward to...wherever it is. He’s not sure yet. But he doesn’t want to say goodbye to this place, to the little bits of gold he’s found here. He doesn’t want to say goodbye to Margaret, or Klinger, or Potter, or even Charles. He doesn’t want to say goodbye to Hawkeye. He can’t accept that he will say goodbye for sure, no matter what Hawkeye says, but he knows he’s going to have to say goodbye to who they were, here, and he hates it. He hates that what they became here will be left with the landscape, capable of being burnt down and forgotten.

BJ wants to run back to the tent. He wants to say _I love you. Do you understand that? I need you to understand that._ He wants to carve an effigy to them somewhere where people will see it thirty, forty, four-hundred years down the line. “We were here! And didn’t our worlds change!” it would read, but he doesn’t have the tools or the time.

BJ, frustrated, scuffs his boot against one of the rocks lining the road. An idea strikes him, and he smiles.

* * *

They head north up Highway 101. The mist is finally cleared, leaving only ghosts on the evergreen branches as they wind through the coastal range. When they were younger, when they’d just moved in together, they would pack up the car on a whim and drive to wherever seemed interesting on a map. Just long enough for the weekend, with Peg and Erin and Val tagging along occasionally. It just got too stifling, sometimes, being in one place for too long, being too comfortable. 

“You and I...us, we were born in motion,” Hawkeye explained it once. “Wounded always coming in, never being able to put our feet to the ground, y’know? So now that we can, it doesn’t feel right. We don’t know how to walk.” This was also around the time that their collective drinking had turned enough heads, and the nightmares weren’t getting any better. After that came the therapists recommended by friends, the ones who weren’t going to try converting you the moment you mentioned you’d been living with a man for four years, and the sobering up, and less last-minute road trips.

It’s been a year or so since their last one, which involved flying into Boston to visit/pester Charles and his live-in boyfriend/chef The Maurice Beaumont (as Charles was so inclined to call him) and then renting a car to drive all the way up to Syracuse University to surprise Erin. They’d done it in the middle of fall, when the air smelled of burned leaves and wet bark, and the hills were alive with crimson. Simon & Garfunkel had been playing on the radio as they argued over directions and picked up the occasional, embarrassing roadside gift shop t-shirt to give to Erin in front of all her friends.

They were doing much of the same now. They make their first stop in Lincoln City, where they take turns finding the most ridiculous thing the antiques stores have to offer and promising to buy it for each other. They do, at one point, get kicked out of a store for the amount of the profanity they manage to say before lunchtime. Then, heading even farther up, they park the Chevy by the side of the road and eat their sandwiches. Finding themselves still hungry, they go to a nearby diner and share a slice of lemon meringue pie. 

“So are you gonna tell me?” Hawkeye asks at their table.

“We’re not there yet,” BJ says. 

Then they drive through Pacific City, and decide to hike the sand dune at Cape Kiwanda. They get halfway up before their joints start to ache, and they have to sit in the sand, watching people pass around them. They shuck their jackets and catch their breath the next couple of minutes.

“What about now?” Hawkeye asks.

BJ shakes his head. “Not there yet.” He doesn’t know where ‘there’ is, to be honest. He’s just biding his time until five o’clock, when everyone should be in position and everything set up just how he’s planned. He has the impulse, quick, to race back down and call the house, but he trusts that everything is okay. Besides, he’s wiped. He takes a few more breaths. “Dammit, we’re getting old.”

“We’re fifty,” Hawkeye says. “We’re not old, we’re middle aged.”

BJ nods. “We’re silver foxes.”

“We’re sexy!” Hawkeye proclaims, much to the embarrassment of the other beachgoers, and leans back to cross his legs. “We are a couple of sexy, alluring, _charmingly_ middle-aged men.”

“And fit!” BJ adds.

“ _And_ fit! We’d probably be at the top of the dune if we hadn’t…exercised, this morning,” he says, minding the people making the trek around them. “Takes the energy out of you, you know.” BJ watches as Hawkeye stares at the cresting dune. “We could get up there, easy.”

BJ also looks at the top of the climb. It looks so far away. “Easy peasy lemon-squeezy.” They stare at the top a little more, breath evening out. “Race you?” BJ asks.

“You’re on,” Hawkeye says, and neither of them move. Hawkeye sighs and lays down. “Dammit, we are old.”

They lead each other down the dune with their hands splayed against the small of the other’s back. They clamber over the sandstone exposed in the low tide instead. Hawkeye goes out further, trying to find tide pools, while BJ stays back and admires the way the incoming waves move around the rock, the little pathways they’ve created for themselves. Hawkeye will beckon BJ over and point out the occasional sea star or hermit crab hiding between the barnacles. From there he goes into stories of tide pool fishing when he was younger, when him and all the neighborhood kids would take buckets and try to collect as many green crabs as they possibly could, and how the crybaby of the group would get pinched and end up running home to their mother. He admits, at the end, that he was the crybaby on a few occasions, “but when Mom died I manned up. I only cried every other time.” 

BJ relates his own tales of camping, and fishing for crawdads with raw hotdogs. They make promises to go camping again sometime, along with a hundred other half-promises they make when they get like this. They also promise to go down to Big Sur again, and to fly over to Maine to go lobster fishing, and to ask Peg and Val if they want to go crabbing once winter hits. Some of these might come to fruition, most will not, but they treat every scenario with copious planning and serious consideration. By the time they’re done, they realize that the tide is coming in, and get soaked up to their knees making it back to the beach.

They drive further north. When they stop at Cannon Beach, Haystack Rock looming over them as if its own island, foreign to the land around it, Hawkeye asks, “Are you gonna tell me now?”

The day is beginning to wind down. BJ’s already beginning to get hungry again. “Not yet,” he says. Hawkeye’s got a look on his face, like he wants to say something, but it’s gone the second it came. Instead, he hooks his pinky finger around BJ’s, the light on the horizon hitting his face just right so he glows like something else. They look upon the monolith, not a care in the world, as even the seagulls start to fly home.

* * *

Back in time, BJ haunts the porch of an old white house in Maine. He’s been standing outside the door for the past fifteen minutes, half-freezing to death, with a bag of flour in the crook of each arm. The only source of warmth he has is his ratty blue sweater, his jacket, and the porch light. It sheds a warm glow on the snow-drowned Adirondack chairs, and the old metal mezuzah nailed to the doorpost. From inside, he can hear music playing, but not much else. He breathes in, both bags of flour into the crook of one arm, and knocks on the door.

Seeing Hawkeye shouldn’t be such a swift kick in the chest, but it is. When he opens the door, clad in a flannel shirt and jeans, looking positively civilian, BJ realizes how much he’s missed him. Or, no, that’s not right. He’s missed Hawkeye every day since they left, but this is the first time he’s allowed himself to really _feel_ it. He doesn’t cry, because Hawkeye already looks bewildered, if not a little awestruck, but it’s a near thing. He grins as wide as he can instead.

“Hi stranger,” he says, fighting back a shiver. “I, uh. I know this is no clock tower in Grand Central, but...”

Hawkeye gets a funny look on his face, eyes going between BJ, the bags of flour, and BJ again. “Hi,” he says, like he can’t believe the words coming out of his mouth. “What are you doing out here?”

BJ fumbles. The words, long practiced, fall short on his tongue. “Uh—it’s kind of a long story—”

“No, I mean what are you doing out here? Get inside,” Hawkeye says, and pulls BJ into the house. “Maine’s no good for someone of your sunny constitution.”

“Hawk, I braved colder winters than this in Korea,” BJ argues, but allows himself to be pulled inside.

“You barely survived those without my expertise,” Hawkeye says. “What’s with the baking project?” he asks.

“What?” BJ asks, then remembers bags of flour in the crook of his arm. “Oh. The supermarket was out of fresh flowers, so I improvised.”

Hawkeye grins. “I’m not that easy. You should’ve bought me chocolates.”

BJ reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a half-melted Hershey bar. _I know you better than I think you do_ , he doesn’t say, because it doesn’t need saying. Hawkeye eyes it, smiles warily, and points. “You brought props,” he says. He takes the chocolate and flour from BJ and places it on an end table. “So,” he says.

“So,” BJ responds.

It takes them only a second of silence before they’re wrapping their arms around each other. BJ revels in the feeling of Hawkeye in his arms, but it’s short-lived as Hawkeye shivers and pulls away. “Fuck, you’re freezing. How long were you out there?”

“I’d tell you, but I’d be embarrassing myself,” BJ says, and Hawkeye eyes him like he’s waiting for some kind of punchline. BJ toes his boots off and shrugs off his jacket, careful to keep the mess of mud and snow to a minimum. If Hawkeye notices the sweater he has on, oversized and already falling apart, he doesn’t mention it.

“Uh, are you—are you hungry?” Hawkeye asks. He still sounds half-lost. BJ imagines that if he were in Hawkeye’s shoes he would sound the same kind of way. “Thirsty?”

“Parched,” BJ says, “but don’t make anything on my account.”

“No, no, I’d be happy to. Make yourself at home.”

BJ follows him further into the house, where he can hear and smell a fireplace roaring alive. There’s a record still playing, but BJ can’t make out the artist. The house is nothing like he imagined Hawkeye’s childhood home would be—for some reason he imagined it all blue and nautical, with fishing gear strewn everywhere. Instead everything is brown and red, floorboards creaking under their feet, the walls lined with photos of relatives and a younger Hawkeye grinning with his arms around people BJ doesn’t know or recognize. Everything is huddled in close—in the hallway they have to walk single file, for fear of knocking into a side table littered with more pictures and the occasional pile of mail. Hawkeye’s got a grasp on his sleeve as he leads him in, happy to give little stories and jokes about the occasional photo or knick-knack. In one doorway BJ spies a tower of pencil marks, with a height and a year, the handwriting changing halfway through to something blockier. In another, he spies a bathroom and a toothbrush sitting in a jar. All these little bits of Hawkeye’s life that he’s never mentioned, that he’s being able to see now. 

A small part of BJ thinks about all of the things he’ll learn about Hawkeye in the future, if he doesn’t make a fool of himself. He already knows how Hawkeye brushes his teeth, but how does he do the dishes? How does he sit on the couch? How does he take his eggs? His toast? What’s his nighttime routine, when he has a bed to fall into? Which cupboard does he put his cups and bowls in? BJ wants to know all of these things. He’s hoping he’ll be able to.

A larger part of him reminds him that this could all go wrong. In truth, he hasn’t had much of a plan other than to show up and confess his feelings. Wandering into the living room, Hawkeye's father reading a book in one of the chairs, he feels like he’s lost his footing.

“Dad,” Hawkeye says. “This is BJ.”

Hawkeye’s father is more compact than BJ had imagined—in truth, he’d pictured an older Hawkeye, instead of this man whose all squares, adorned with a thick head of white hair and who can’t be taller than 5’8. He looks up, smiles, and marks his book. “The famous BJ Hunnicutt!” he says, walking over to greet them. BJ shakes his hand. “Glad to see you in the flesh. I’ve heard plenty of stories.”

“All of them good, I hope,” BJ jokes.

“From Hawkeye’s letters alone, you’d think you’d hung the moon,” Daniel Pierce says, which sends a small thrill through BJ’s chest.

Hawkeye clears his throat. “Dad, I think maybe you should get to bed,” he says.

Daniel frowns. “Why? It’s only seven. I’m wide awake, I don’t—” He looks to Hawkeye, and BJ catches the tail end of a thumb-jerk before he amends himself. “Ah. Uh, you know, now that I think about it, I _do_ have an early morning tomorrow.” Daniel looks to BJ. “He’s always looking out for me.”

“I’m sure,” BJ says.

“Except for the occasional bouts of elder abuse, he’s a model son,” Daniel deadpans.

Hawkeye shrugs. “What can I say? Nobody’s perfect.”

As Daniel walks off towards his bedroom, Hawkeye fixes them both drinks—not gin, he notices, but scotch on the rocks. “No martinis?” BJ asks.

“I’ve grown too refined in my tastes,” Hawkeye says. “They taste like water. And I get nauseous when I’m near olives.” BJ can’t tell if he’s joking or not, but he knows he’s trying his best to make it sound like a one-liner.

“Bad memories?” BJ asks.

“Good ones,” Hawkeye tells him, not looking at him. He hands BJ his drink. “Here.” They settle into the couch next to the fireplace, and Hawkeye holds his drink up. “A toast to, to..” He seems to think about it a bit before looking at BJ. “...to old friends."

BJ smiles. "To new beginnings."

“To peace,” Hawkeye counters.

“To wooing peaceably,” BJ flirts.

“To wool sweaters,” Hawkeye says, hooking a finger into a loose thread on BJ’s own. Yes, he recognizes it, he definitely recognizes it. BJ is certain of that.

“To…” BJ says, but finds his mind go blank, nerves aflutter and his face red. “To us,” he finishes.

“To us,” Hawkeye agrees, and they clink their glasses together.

BJ gestures to the living room. "This is a nice place you've got here. Nice town."

Hawkeye laughs into his drink. "Oh, yes, I'm sure we're absolutely cosmopolitan compared to that small hamlet they call San Francisco. Our 3 block downtown is being featured in all the latest travel magazines."

"You'll have to show me the sights,” BJ says, leaning in.

Hawkeye leans back. "I show you mine, you show me yours."

"When you come over I'll be sure to.”

"When, huh?” Hawkeye says. He leans back, and BJ miss the warmth in the air, despite the fire glowing not five feet from the both of them. “That's awfully presumptuous. You should check in with Peg first, make sure she's okay with that sort of thing going on inside her house."

"I'm sure she won't mind,” BJ says. “We don't live in the same house anymore."

"Ha. Right," Hawkeye says. He looks at BJ, as if waiting for the other line to drop, but none comes. He frowns. “I don't get it."

"There's nothing to get,” BJ tells him. “I'm being dead serious. The divorce is still…” He plays with the rim of his glass. He can’t exactly go into detail about him and Peg mutually coming out to each other, much less the messy legal dealings they’ve been embroiled in ever since. The two of them joke together that if they knew divorcing was this hard, they would’ve called for a cheaper wedding. “...well, it's in the works, but—look, actually, I need to tell you why I'm here."

"Wait, wait, what do you mean 'divorce'?" Hawkeye asks, ever obstinate.

BJ laughs despite himself. "I think I spelled it out for you, Hawk."

"No, no, no,” Hawkeye says. He stands up and starts to pace. _I can't help but pace! It's a prerequisite to thinking,_ Hawkeye had told him once, as he’d worried over a spinal injury patient and practically stomped dents into their mattresses. _They should've called me when they invented the pacemaker, that's how important it is to me_. “You, you go home to San Francisco. You have a wonderful life with a wonderful wife and kid and patch up scrapes and bruises all day. You go out for drinks on Friday nights and golf on Sundays. You get back to normal. You end up fine."

BJ would’ve believed that, if Hawkeye had told him that at the beginning. He would’ve hung onto any thread of normalcy that was given to him. But that was then, and this is now. "And you?” he asks. “How do you end up?"

"How...how I end up isn't important, Beej,” Hawkeye tells him, the fight going out of his voice for a moment. Like it’s insignificant. Like it’s second-rate to this image he’s made of BJ’s life. 

"It is to me,” BJ says, because it’s the truth. If Hawkeye won’t accept that, then BJ will do enough for the both of them. He finds a well of bravery coming up his throat. "You want to know how you end up?"

"Confused in my own living room?" Hawkeye jokes.

BJ nods. "I think you end up with your best friend knocking on your door,” he tells him, and then there’s a look on Hawkeye’s face. This is a story. They’re both comfortable with stories.

"On a Tuesday night, no less,” Hawkeye parries.

"What can I say? I'm spontaneous,” BJ jokes. It’s natural, it’s impulse. He feels his nerves get the best of him. “And uh, and you sit down for a few drinks, and after a while he gets up and he goes to the record player." He does just that, going through the shelves until he finds something that sends a sentimental spark down his spine, and he pulls it out of the shelves. "And he chooses something both of you will know." He pulls the record out of its sleeve, places it on the player, and drops the needle where he wants it. He turns around, facing Hawkeye. "And then. Well, then he'll ask you to dance."

Hawkeye blinks and shakes his head. The player hums, low. _Kiss me once, then kiss me twice, then kiss me once again, It's been a long, long time._ "I'm not following."

"Well that's a shame,” BJ says. Maybe Hawk’s not getting the message. He walks up to Hawkeye, so there’s barely a foot of space between them, and offers his hand. “I was hoping to lead."

“Oh, well in that case,” Hawkeye says, and takes the hand with a little flourish. They’re both so hesitant when they put their hands on each other. This isn’t an act, or to serve some sort of purpose. This is for them only, and so BJ allows himself to lay nervous fingers on the small of Hawkeye’s back. If either of them’s breath quickens, neither mentions it. "What happens next?" Hawkeye asks, desperate.

"I guess...you dance,” BJ says, and they do so. One step, two step. He can feel Hawkeye readjusting his grip on BJ’s shoulder, inching closer to his neck. BJ tightens his grip on Hawkeye’s hip, but only just so. 

_You'll never know how many dreams I dreamed about you_ , the record croons, and BJ keeps looking to Hawkeye, hoping he’ll get the message. He has to get the message, it’s spelled out so clear. Like lines in the sand. Like moving rocks in the middle of the night. Like words that mean something, if you look at them the right way. But Hawkeye keeps looking back at him. He’s grinning, but not in a way that meets his eyes. More like he’s doing a show on a tightrope, and he’s trying his best not to fall. He looks scared.

BJ gulps, and he knows he has to be brave. “And he…” Breathe in, breathe out. He’s been to war, this should be nothing. Why isn’t it nothing? “...he tells you that he loves you,” he says, feeling his breath give out. “I love you, Hawk, I have for..." He laughs, bashful. His heart’s in his throat. “God, I’ve lost track, but it’s been a long, long time. I love you so much.”

When he looks at Hawkeye again, he’s got a confused look on his face, like he missed his cue and doesn’t know where to pick up. Their faces are inches apart. "And when does Lana Turner come in?"

"She doesn't,” BJ tells him.

“Ava Gardner?” Hawkeye asks, face getting serious. BJ’s heart sinks.

“Neither does she.”

Hawkeye searches BJ’s face. "So where's the punchline?" he asks, voice thin.

“There is no punchline, Hawk,” BJ says earnestly. They stop dancing, but they’ve still got their hands on each other. BJ shakes his head, feeling this decision collapsing in on itself every second that Hawkeye looks at him like the world’s ending. “I…Look, I—I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

Hawkeye grabs him by his collar and kisses him. He tastes like scotch, and salt, and a bit of garlic from dinner—BJ doesn’t mind, though. BJ’s over the moon. BJ can feel his chest exploding with happiness, and he finds his nervous hands trailing up to cup Hawkeye’s jaw and rub his thumbs along his hairline. Anything to sweeten the moment. The kiss deepens for a moment—neither of them will be able to tell whose lips parted first—before Hawkeye pulls back.

“Don’t apologize,” he rasps.

“Okay,” BJ agrees, and can feel a giggle bubbling up from the warm, golden place in the pit of his stomach.

Hawkeye searches BJ’s face. “Can I hear you say it again?”

“I love you,” BJ says. “I love you so much—”

“I love you, too,” Hawkeye says, and BJ feels his whole being go gold with happiness. Hawkeye laughs through his nose. “Holy shit, we love each other.”

“We love each other!” BJ agrees, laughing all the meanwhile, and goes back in to kiss Hawkeye again.

“We love—oh, god. Mmph.” They stand there for a bit, reveling in this newfound information and all that in entails. Hawkeye has wrapped his arms around BJ’s neck. BJ’s trying to figure out what he can do with his hands, now that he’s got the opportunity. He resolves, instead, to take a step forward, and Hawkeye takes a step back. To call it a dance would be an insult to dancers everywhere, but BJ leads, and Hawkeye follows, until Hawkeye’s legs hit the couch and they go if not fully horizontal, then at a sufficient 35 degree angle that’ll hurt in the morning.

BJ revels in this freedom, so readily available to him: to kiss Hawkeye, to make him feel good without any fear or hold-ups. Later he’ll think about all the other times he came close to this—to the dances, to the words they hid behind, to all the little notions and motions they used to collide without consequence—and realize that none of them compare. That fear of consequence seems so silly now—he loves consequence. He loves being able to card his fingers through Hawkeye’s hair, to feel the other man’s fingers trailing up and down his arms, to kiss under his ear and realize how crazy it drives him. If this is the consequence BJ has been so readily avoiding, he’s been a fool for years.

“I hope you know I’m not usually this easy,” Hawkeye jokes.

“I got you chocolate,” BJ reasons, and kisses him.

“That you did,” Hawkeye says when they break apart, making quick work of getting his hand underneath BJ’s shirt. He’s touching him like a man starved. “I suppose that means you get the full package.”

“Then aren’t I the luckiest man on the earth?”

“Don’t make this a competition, Beej.”

“I’ll lose?”

“I’ll win.”

“ _Ah_. Gotcha.” BJ leans back and manages to get a leg over, straddling Hawkeye. He can feel them both getting hard, and starts to undo the buttons of Hawkeye’s shirt. Then he sees Hawkeye—really sees him, with his hair looking like it's gone through a windstorm, his clothes wrecked, and the half-lidded look of someone in love. “God, you’re beautiful,” BJ says, voice punched out. 

“You’re one to talk,” Hawkeye jokes, but his eyes are getting glassy. He sighs. “As much as I love the idea of couch sex, I think we’d traumatize my poor father.”

That draws a laugh out of BJ. He climbs off of Hawkeye, and offers a hand. When he pulls Hawkeye up off the couch, he gives into impulse and kisses him again. Hawkeye makes a surprised little sound, and they do a reverse-waltz. The record is still playing. BJ hooks his fingers into Hawkeye’s belt loops, and starts heading for the hall.

“Last door on the left,” Hawkeye tells him between kisses. They nearly bump into a side table, which prompts BJ to pull away and take Hawkeye by the sleeve. 

Hawkeye’s bedroom is small, an obvious mishmash of the kid it once housed and the adult man now occupying it. His college degrees sit next to spelling bee ribbons, his closet full of shirts and suits with Groucho glasses sitting on the shelf above. BJ’s sure that if he went through every nook and cranny there would be a story for Hawkeye to tell him, ones that he’s probably heard before and ones that Hawkeye barely remembers himself.

Hawkeye closes the door behind him, and the energy changes. This is happening. This is very real, very now. For a moment their only point of contact is BJ’s fingers on Hawkeye’s sleeve. They look at each other, feeling the weight of the anticipation in the air, and they burst out laughing. Because it’s ridiculous that it took them this long, because it’s wonderful that it’s happening, because of a thousand little reasons. Because this is what they do when the world moves out from under their feet.

They laugh as they kick off their shoes, they laugh as they take off their clothes, they laugh through kissing each other to the bed. Hawkeye falls onto the bed first, tugging BJ along with him. BJ cups Hawkeye’s face and kisses him. Softly at first, but it soon melts into something more heated. Hawkeye doesn’t seem to know where to put his hands, fingers roaming over BJ’s chest, his arms, his back. BJ hums and moves to squeeze Hawkeye’s ass, earning him a small, indignant squeak.

“Tease,” Hawkeye hums. BJ takes that as a challenge and, dipping his fingers under Hawkeye’s waistband, takes Hawkeye’s dick in his hand and starts slowly stroking. The man lets out a groan, eyes blown. “Oh, that’s dirty. Dirty, dirty.”

“You want me to stop?” BJ teases.

“Stop and I’ll never speak to you again,” Hawkeye says. “I’ll...I’ll walk into the sea. I’ll join a convent. I’ll do unspeakable things if you stop. Oh, _god_ , that’s good.” 

BJ grins at Hawkeye’s rambling, and moves to suck a bruise on his neck. He’s already begun to rut up against Hawkeye’s hip, arousal sparking up his bloodstream with each thrust. He lets out a deep moan when one of Hawkeye’s hands finally finds itself around BJ’s own dick.

It doesn’t take long—there’s probably a joke to be made about years-long foreplay, but they’re both too busy half-mumbling a babble of expletives and I love yous. Hawkeye comes with BJ thumbing his nipple and lets out a shout. BJ follows not far behind, kissing Hawkeye into the mattress while his body bursts alive with pleasure. When they both come to, BJ rolls off Hawkeye with a sigh. He’s sticky, and covered in sweat, and the happiest he’s been in ages.

“And that’s how you end up,” BJ says. “After the war, I mean.”

Hawkeye laughs out a breath. “I gotta say, I prefer your ending.” He looks the happiest BJ’s ever seen him—the easiest smile on his face, voice half-fucked to raspiness, beard burn forming around his lips. BJ can’t help the smile that grows on his face, or the giggle of pure happiness that escapes from his chest. Hawkeye frowns. “What?”

“Nothing,” BJ says through the laughter. “I just love you.” And it’s so simple to say, so easy and true he feels like he’s floating. 

“I’ve loved you since the day I met you,” Hawkeye tells him, and BJ doesn’t have anything to say to that. He feels Hawkeye’s warm hands reach out and along his chest, and feels the bed shift. He wraps an arm around Hawkeye as the man curls around his side. Sleep starts to fall over him—its been a long, exciting day. He flew across the country. He just made the happiest love of his life. He can only guess what kind of blissful, dreamless sleep he’ll fall into, Hawkeye in his arms and their bodies at rest.

In the living room, the record player sings a loop of static, unheard by the two sleeping bodies down the hall.

* * *

Hawkeye doesn’t say anything when BJ starts heading back south. He just gives a questioning look, and BJ would answer him if he could, but he doesn’t want to ruin anything. They drive as it starts to get dark, the radio on a low static hum. When he catches glimpses of Hawkeye, he’s fidgeting with the volume knob, or crossing his arms, or sighing. Something’s wrong—BJ knows that something is wrong, that he’s frustrated, but he has to believe it’s worth it for the look on Hawk’s face when he gets back home. He has to.

When they get back home, it looks so innocuous. The house lights are on, yellow light shining on the dark interior of the car. It looks like any other night. If it weren’t for the vague shadows moving beyond the window blinds, BJ would suspect it all went to shit. Anticipation brims on the edge of his nerves, ready to burst out at any moment. Months of planning, _finally_ , and here’s the payoff. He unbuckles his seatbelt, and is about to open the car door when he sees that Hawkeye is sitting still. Hawkeye never sits still.

“Don’t you wanna come inside?” BJ asks.

“Beej,” Hawkeye says, and it’s too quiet for comfort. “Are you gonna tell me now?”

BJ sighs. “I’ll tell you,” he says, “when you get out of the car.”

Hawkeye shakes his head. “I’m not getting out of the car until you tell me.”

BJ rubs his forehead with the heel of his hand. “God, you can be so _stubborn_ —”

Hawkeye comes alive. “ _I’m_ stubborn? Me?” he asks, like he’s rehearsed this fight. “I’m stubborn, when you’ve been adamant about not telling me anything all day? Or for the past couple weeks with your side conversations and your, your hushed phone calls.” BJ lets out a sigh. He really thought he’d done a good job of hiding those, damn it. “Yes, I did notice, thank you.” Hawkeye looks him in the eye, and BJ doesn’t say a word. “Are you leaving me?”

That throws him for a loop. “What?” he asks, incredulous. “No! Why would I do that?”

“I don’t know, why are you acting so weird?” Hawkeye volleys back.

“Because! I—” BJ grits his teeth and puts his head in his hands. “Dammit, this was supposed to be a surprise.”

“A surprise?” Hawkeye asks, his turn now to be thrown for a loop. BJ feels a finger poking his shoulder. “What was supposed to be a surprise?” BJ doesn’t know what to say—he’s so _close_ , it was supposed to be perfect! It can’t end up like this. He feels another poke. “Paint a picture for me, come on.”

BJ rubs his eyes and shakes his head. For a moment, the idea of it—the surprise, the shock—still holds weight, until it doesn’t anymore. “Okay,” he says. “Okay, imagine you’re with this...this wonderful man.”

“Handsome, I’m sure,” Hawkeye adds.

BJ laughs. “Oh, _exceedingly_ handsome. And you love each other, you do! You’ve never been more sure about anything else in your life, but you don’t…you don’t remember the day you met.” He shakes his head. “Or you do, but you don’t remember what the day was. It’s fine, in the grand scheme of things, but other couples have that down pat, you know? It bugs you, but not too much. And then, one day…” He goes into his wallet and fishes out the picture Peg sent him, handing it over. “You get this in the mail.”

Hawkeye takes it. BJ watches as he holds it up to the little light they have, eyes lighting up. “Hey, look at us!” he exclaims. The smile on his face is priceless. His thumbs trace the outlines of their faces. “God, we’re so young.”

“Yeah,” BJ says, unable to keep the smile off his face. He taps the photo. ”Read the back.”

Hawkeye turns the photo over. _Rosie’s Bar_ , it reads. _September 12th, 1951. Helluva first day on the job._ Hawkeye’s face falls into something more reverent. “Beej…”

“So imagine you see that,” BJ says, barreling ahead. “I mean, what else are you supposed to do? You call up your friends, your family. You start planning something. Something big because, because...it’s the most important day of your life! It’s the day everything changed, even though you didn’t realize it until later. And to think, all of the parties and gifts we’ve missed because we could never remember. Imagine you...you want to make up for it, somehow.” He feels suddenly sheepish, for keeping this secret for so long. For causing Hawkeye so much worry. ”I just wanted it to be special, Hawk. I’m sorry—”

He’s interrupted by Hawkeye grabbing him by his jacket and kissing him, hard. BJ’s hands, instinctively, go for Hawkeye’s hair, and nearly lift the knit cap off his head. After a few seconds, Hawkeye pulls away from him, and BJ hears the car door open and close. “Well, what are you waiting for?” he hears, and BJ opens his eyes to see Hawkeye standing in front of the car. “Come on! I don’t wanna be late to our own party.”

When they go up the steps to their front door, they’re grabbing at each other’s cuffs like younger lovers. From the porch, they can hear the sounds of people in idle chatter, and the occasional shout of laughter. Each voice is recognizable—they can hear Klinger and Soon-Lee catching up with Radar and his wife, and Margaret engaging in a healthy, if passionate, debate with Val as Peg and Elaine chat off to the side. Though they can’t hear it now, he’s sure Charles and Maurice are regaling some unfortunate soul about their recent trip to Greece. Interspersed between that are dozens of other voices—other friends they’ve had for decades, friends they’ve gained. This isn’t the first party they’ve hosted like this, but it feels new all the same. It always does.

“I can’t _believe_ you thought I was leaving you,” BJ says, shaking his head.

“I was being dramatic!” Hawkeye argues. “And you were acting suspicious. It’s a good thing I love you.”

BJ smiles, soft. “Same to you, stupid,” he says, and kisses Hawkeye lightly on the cheek.

Pulling away, BJ captures Hawkeye’s hand in his own, lacing their fingers together. With the other, he reaches for the doorknob. For a second, he revels in the moment—the warm hand in his, the cold, mossy air, and the golden light coming from the windows.

 _One day_ , he imagines telling his younger self, _you’ll throw a party for the man you love most in the world. You’ll open the door and see rooms of smiling faces, of friends and loved ones who are still happy to see you. You’ll take this man by the hand and lead him inside, where everyone will cheer congratulations, and you’ll swap funny old stories over cake and punch. You’ll laugh and dance the night away, until it’s just the few stragglers left on the back deck. You’ll reminisce and watch the stars, and the man you love will be in your arms pointing out the constellations. He’ll tell the whole party every story he has about them. And, when even the stragglers have gone, you’ll walk hand in hand, back to your bed, and fall asleep with smiles on your faces._

If you had told him, twenty years from today, that this is where he would’ve ended up, he wouldn’t have believed you. He wouldn’t have believed it possible. 

The moment passes. Hawkeye squeezes his hand, and BJ squeezes back. He opens the door, and the house comes alive.

**Author's Note:**

> The poem BJ reads is "Lullaby" by W.H. Auden. All descriptions of Newport/the Oregon coast in general come from the god knows how many times I've visited it. You can find me, sometimes, as [billypotts](https://billypotts.tumblr.com) on tumblr.


End file.
